Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli’s China visit has boosted the Nepal-China bilateral relations to a new height of strategic partnership, according to China Study Center-Nepal.

During this visit, as many as 10 significant agreements on areas of strategic importance for the development of Nepal from a long-term perspective have been signed, said the center in a statement, adding the agreements have opened up new vista for increased mutual collaboration and cooperation, and continued Chinese economic assistance and investment on projects of strategic importance and enhancement of trans-Himalayan connectivity.

The agreements and the joint statement issued subsequently cover a wide range of areas of mutual interest and concern relating to transit and international trade; railways, aviation, road and bridge construction, free trade and banking, infrastructure development, energy, tourism, education, culture and intellectual property.

The Center regards the signing of Transit Transport Treaty between Nepal and China as an achievement of unprecedented historical importance which, the center said, will go a long way in diversifying Nepal’s international trade and transit interests by facilitating its economic development and alternative route for its free access to sea.

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s call to expand practical cooperation to make two nations a “community of common destiny” is highly commendable, said the center. It said the visit to China, on the heel of the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two counties, has added a new geo-economic dimension to existing bilateral relations.

During the visit, the formal entry of Nepal as a dialogue partner in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, mention of Nepal as a founding member of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and its reassertion that it would play a proactive role in integrating with the China-initiated One-Road and One-Belt project are the remarkable  components as both look forward to a close partnership of strategic significance in the years to come, said Sundar Nath Bhattarai, acting chairman of the China Study Center.