New Delhi: China on Wednesday said it has “taken note” of the Supply Chain Resilience Initiative launched by India, Japan and Australia and hoped that the three countries would “respect” the laws of market economy and free trade rules.
Asked to comment on the three-nation initiative that is seen by some as aimed at countering China’s dominance on trade, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian said, “We have taken note of the situation. The formation and development of global industrial and supply chains are determined by market forces and companies choices.
The relationship between the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain is that of division of labour for win-win cooperation, rather than charity or alms-giving from one side to the other.”
“Artificial industrial ‘transfer’ is an unrealistic approach that goes against the economic laws and can neither solve domestic problems nor do anything good to the stability of the global industrial and supply chains, or to the stable recovery of the world economy,” he added.
India, Japan and Australia on Tuesday formally launched the supply chain initiative to create a virtuous cycle of enhancing supply chain resilience with a view to eventually attaining strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth in the region.
“Amid the COVID-19 epidemic, we hope that parties concerned will cherish the hard-won outcomes of international cooperation in the fight against the epidemic, respect the laws of market economy and free trade rules, and act in ways conducive to enhancing mutual trust and cooperation, so as to jointly ensure the global industrial and supply chains stable and unimpeded with a vision of strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth of the world economy,” Zhao said.
