China is becoming a major player on the world stage, said Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who will pay a two-day visit to China on Friday.
"I believe China can play a positive role in many big issues on a world scale. The issues in Europe, I know that China is willing to do that, is trying to do that, in the debt crisis in Europe," Rutte told Xinhua in an interview.
"With the unprecedented and large scale growth of the Chinese economy, China clearly is on his way to become a major player on the world stage," he said. "I am very much looking forward to engaging with the Chinese leadership" to see how bilateral relationship can help to further build our perspective roles in the world.
The 46-year-old prime minister described China and the Netherlands are "strong partners," believing that they could work together to face many important issues.
Rutte said he was also very much looking forward to his visit to China, noting "this will be a political mission together with a trade mission, we will have many large companies traveling with us."
"I believe this visit should focus on the main areas of our relationship, which are cultural, historical and political and obviously trade and economy," he said.
According to the latest statistics, bilateral economic trade between China and the Netherlands reached around 68 billion U.S. dollars in 2012. The Netherlands has been China's second-biggest trade partner in the European Union for ten consecutive years.
Lauding bilateral trade relations as good, Rutte said "there are more possibilities to explore."
"We have already laid a lot of contacts in the agricultural industry, but I think that we should build on these contacts more and explore other opportunities too," he said. "That is exactly what I would like to reach with my visit."
