The 3rd High-level Symposium of Think Tanks of China and Centraland Eastern European Countries was held on December 16th atDiaoyutai State Guesthouse. The symposium was co-organized by theMinistry of Foreign Affairs of China, Chinese Academy of SocialSciences (CASS) and China Foundation for International Studies. NieQing, Vice President of SUIBE and Shang Hongyu, Deputy Director ofSUIBE’s Centre for Central and Eastern European Studies (CCEES)addressed the symposium on Advancing China-CEEC Connectivity andCooperation: Problems and Suggestions.
The symposium took place shortly after the 4th Summit of China andCentral and Eastern European Countries (hereinafter referred to as16+1 Summit). Following the Suzhou Guidelines adopted at thesummit, it was a timely effort to have exchanges among think tankas support for the 16+1 cooperation. A high-level meeting forChina-CEEC think tanks cooperation with the largest scale andcoverage, the symposium was well attended by over 200 participants,approximately 150 from 16 CEE countries. Liu Haixing, AssistantForeign Minister, Wang Weiguang, President of the Chinese Academyof Social Sciences, Victor Ponta, former Prime Minister of Romania,and Ante Simonić, former Deputy Prime Minister of Croatia attendedthe symposium.
China-CEEC Think Tanks Network was launched at the symposium, animportant follow-up result of the Belgrade Guidelines adopted atthe 3rd 16+1 Summit. CCEES is one of the first council members ofthe network. Deputy Director Shang attended the first CouncilMeeting on December 17th at the Institute of European Studies ofCASS.