Premier Li Qiang emphasized the importance of expanding trade and investment between China and Japan during a meeting with a Japanese business delegation in Beijing. The meeting, held at the Great Hall of the People, was led by Yohei Kono, president of the Japanese Association for the Promotion of International Trade. Premier Li highlighted the strategic and mutually beneficial relationship between the two nations, recalling the recent agreement between President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba to advance bilateral ties. He stressed the need for proactive actions to strengthen political mutual trust and people-to-people connections, urging both countries to manage differences constructively and promote stable bilateral relations. Premier Li also pointed out the challenges posed by the evolving international landscape and called for leveraging the industrial complementarity and technological expertise of both nations to explore new areas of cooperation, such as the digital economy, green economy, and biopharmaceuticals. He reaffirmed China’s commitment to high-standard opening-up and welcomed Japanese enterprises to expand their presence in China. The meeting followed the sixth China-Japan High-Level Economic Dialogue in Tokyo, where both sides reached a 20-point consensus to deepen economic cooperation. Kono acknowledged China as Japan’s most important economic partner and emphasized the need for enhanced communication to safeguard multilateralism and the free trade system. Since the normalization of diplomatic relations in 1972, bilateral trade has grown over 300-fold, with accumulated investment nearing $140 billion.