Spain’s King Felipe VI meets Xi Jinping in Beijing, marking his first state visit to China since his father’s 2014 abdication and celebrating 20 years of bilateral ties
BEIJING: Spanish King Felipe VI received a royal welcome from Chinese leader Xi Jinping during his first state visit to China since his father’s abdication in 2014.
The monarch arrived with his wife Queen Letizia in a limousine at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People where they met Xi, accompanied by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Commerce Minister Wang Wentao.
Xi, who received his own grand welcome in Spain during his 2018 visit, called Felipe “a good friend of the Chinese people” during their meeting.
The king responded that “a relationship of trust has been forged” between the two nations.
This week marks the 20th anniversary of high-level bilateral ties between Spain and China.
Felipe’s father, the exiled former King Juan Carlos, was the first Spanish monarch to make a state visit to China in 1978.
Juan Carlos’s last state visit to China occurred in 2007 when he met former Chinese president Hu Jintao.
The current 57-year-old monarch has visited China on other occasions, including for the Beijing Summer Olympics in 2008.
China remains Spain’s largest trading partner in Asia and its fourth largest globally, according to Spanish Royal Household data. – AFP
