At the invitation of Wu Bangguo, chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, Speaker of the Pakistani National Assembly, Chaudhry Amir Hussain arrived in China on October 27 for an official friendly visit to China. A reporter of People's Daily had an interview with him in the afternoon of October 28.

Q: Please introduce the conditions for your visit to China.

A; I have come to China for an official friendly visit at the invitation of Wu Bangguo, chairman of the Chinese National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee. This is the second time for me to come to Beijing. Before this, Pakistani Chairman of the Senate Muhammad Mian Soomro also paid a friendly visit to China. Pakistan and China have maintained a long-term, all-weather friendship. Both sides have close exchanges in areas including government, parliament, education and tourism. Exchange of high level visits is an important aspect of Pakistan-China close and friendly relations. Yesterday Wu Banguo and I held talks. We discussed the relations between the two countries, achieving a good success. I also invited him to visit Pakistan soon.

Q: How do you regard the incident that a Chinese engineer was killed recently in Pakistan?

A: Not long ago, it is unfortunate that Chinese engineers became the target of terrorists and one of them was killed in rescue operation. We are deeply sorry about the killing of a Chinese engineer in Pakistan. China is one of Pakistani friends. China has rendered us a lot of generous assistance in many engineering projects. Some terrorists have lost their basic human nature. They assault anybody they want. At present, the Pakistani government has taken many steps to improve safety environment. All Chinese nationals in Pakistan, especially the technicians, will be given special security protection. We will ensure such incidents do not recur. At the same time the most important is: We will never allow terrorist activities to exert influence on Pakistani-Chinese friendship.

Q: What progress Pakistan has made in anti-terrorism so far?

A: Pakistan has been explicit in its stand against terrorism. We condemn all forms of terrorism. Pakistan is a country suffering terrorism and also is in the forefront of the anti-terrorist struggle. In the past six months, the government has launched several large-scale operations in the tribal areas and in the frontier zones between Pakistan and Afghan, and seized more than 600 al Qaeda-linked terrorists. Due to limited conditions and difficulty for distinguishing some terrorists a certain period of time is needed for the anti-terrorist actions. However, Pakistan will resolutely root out terrorism in its own territory. In this point, China, the international society and we have the same stand.

Q: What areas do you think China and Pakistan can cooperate in?

A. Pakistan and China have close cooperation in anti-terrorism. There are close cooperative and information-sharing treaties signed between the security departments of the two countries. Recently the armed forces of the two countries carried out a joint exercise to strengthen their anti-terrorism cooperation.

Q: The Pakistani National Assembly passed a bill recently supporting Pervez Musharraf to stay as army chief of staff. Does it mean that the Pakistani National Assembly will further support the president policy against terrorism?

A. The anti-terrorism policy implemented by President Musharraf has won support from the Pakistani National Assembly and the Pakistani people. Pakistan needs political stability and regional peace, which can achieve the goal of improving economic development. President Musharraf has made a gradual goal for the country according to his policy. Under his leadership Pakistan has made a prominent increase in its economy with sustainable progress in social and human resources. In addition the regional security environment has also improved obviously.

By People's Daily Online