China to consolidate financial ties with ASEAN to fend off global risks

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Friday pledged to deepen financial and monetary cooperation with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to better deal with global financial risks. "China is ready to work closely with ASEAN ... to gradually put in place a stable and mature regional capital market and enhance the region's ability to resist international financial risks," Wen said in a speech at the summit of the China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit (CABIS) in Nanning, capital city of southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. The Chinese government will expand the scale and scope of currency swaps in the region, strengthen capacity building in regional economic monitoring and boost the development of the Asian bond market, said Wen. He urged for better crisis response mechanisms under the Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralization, a regional currency swap agreement between ASEAN, China, Japan and the Republic of Korea to swap foreign exchange reserves when necessary to fight against speculative attacks on their currencies. China has signed currency swap agreements, worth 841.2 billion yuan (about 132 billion U.S. dollars), with 12 countries or regions since the start of global financial crisis in 2008, according to data from China's central bank.