CHENGDU, June 15 (Xinhua) — Earthquake-stricken Nepal wants to draw experience in reconstruction from China and welcomes Chinese investment in infrastructure and other business ventures, the country’s commerce minister said Monday at a conference held in southwest China economic powerhouse Chengdu.
The devastating earthquake in April and an ensuing tremor in May left nearly 9,000 people dead and another 600,000 displaced in the country resting on the Himalayas.
Sunil Bahadur Thapa, Nepal’s minister for commerce and supplies, said on Monday that China can have a big role to play in Nepal’s post-quake reconstruction and trade.
He promised a sound legal framework for foreign investors and streamlined incorporating procedures at the conference held in Chengdu to rally support for the effort to construct Nepal into a modernized country.
“Compared with aid, we are more interested in trade and market. China and Nepal have maintained close economic ties,” the minister said.
Thapa also visited Wenchuan County in Sichuan Province, which was reconstructed after a 8.0-magnitude earthquake struck the region in 2008, as Nepal seeks to draw experience for its own reconstruction.