El Salvador receives China's flour, fertilizer assistance

China's emergency humanitarian assistance shipment of flour and fertilizer arrived in San Juan Opico and was handed over to the Salvadoran government on Nov 9.

At the handover ceremony, Chinese Ambassador to El Salvador Ou Jianhong said that she was honored to attend the event with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele.  

In her speech, Ou mentioned the report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China in October, which stressed that China had always adhered to its foreign diplomacy of upholding world peace and promoting common development, and remained committed to building a community with a shared future for mankind.

She pointed out that as the world is suffering from food and fertilizer supply crisis, alongside the impact of COVID-19, the supply chain crisis and global inflation, governments across the world are facing a common challenge of ensuring production and livelihoods of their people.

The Chinese government provided emergency humanitarian assistance to El Salvador in response to Hurricane Juliet, Ou noted, saying that this time China overcame its own difficulties to provide emergency flour and fertilizer assistance to the Salvadoran government. It is not only a vivid manifestation of the brotherhood between the two countries, but also the best example of China's major-country diplomacy with Chinese characteristics, she added.

Ou also stressed that since the establishment of China-El Salvador diplomatic ties four years ago, the two countries have supported each other on issues of their core interests, consolidated their political mutual trust, deepened their practical cooperation, and enhanced people-to-people and cultural exchanges, which saw nearly 80 Salvadoran students study in China. The two countries have become good friends and partners that share weal and woe, Ou added.

Bukele thanked the Chinese side for lending a helping hand to El Salvador at a critical moment, saying that the assistance from China would help his country tame inflation, resume production and improve people's livelihoods.

More than 200 people, including Salvadoran government officials, beneficiaries of the assistance program, and journalists from state media, attended the handover ceremony.