Xi sees bright future with longtime friend

Over three decades ago, when President Xi Jinping — who was then the top official of Fuzhou, Fujian province — took an investment promotion trip to Malaysia, he was deeply impressed by two symbolic sites.

One is the Poh San Teng Temple, a long-standing homage to renowned Chinese navigator Zheng He (1371-1433), who lived during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). The other is the city of Sibu, which became known as "New Fuzhou" after Wong Nai Siong, a Fuzhou native, migrated to Malaysia with over 1,000 Chinese people more than a century ago.

Both places testify to the millennium-old China-Malaysia friendship, a bond that Xi has repeatedly pledged to inherit and cement as China's head of state.

During a 2013 visit to Malaysia, he quoted a local proverb to illustrate the commitment: "Flowing water cannot be severed."

It was also during his Southeast Asia tour that year to Indonesia and Malaysia that Xi again invoked the legacy of Zheng He and put forward the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, an essential component of the Belt and Road Initiative.

As Xi travels back to Malaysia for another state visit this week, the two nations are poised to further build on their time-honored friendship and fruitful cooperation, and steer bilateral relations toward a more promising shared future in the new era.