Chongqing- On the evening of May 12th, an online video meeting across nations was held at the Foreign Affairs Office of the Chongqing Municipal Government. Chongqing and its friendly city of Düsseldorf, Germany, and other European cities of Toulouse, France, Palermo, Italy, Reading, United Kingdom, Chemnitz, Germany, Moscow, Russia, and Montreal, Canada which Düsseldorf invited jointly held a webinar themed on the COVID-19 outbreak prevention and control.

Chongqing is a friendly city with Düsseldorf. For this reason, Düsseldorf invited Chongqing to attend this video exchange meeting to discuss and share the concerns and experiences combating the pandemic.

Chongqing experience encouraging international friends

At present, the international community is fighting against the COVID-19 pandemic. It is the general trend to unite and help each other to carry out international anti-pandemic cooperation. The webinar has established a critical communication platform for the friendship cities of several countries.

At 9 p.m., the webinar that spanned eight cities in 7 countries officially began. The participants all shared and exchanged views on the prevention and control of the pandemic, public health protection, hospital capacity building, and measures to promote economic and social recovery and development under the pandemic.

At the meeting, Wang Xiewan, deputy secretary-general of the Chongqing Municipal Government, introduced the positive changes in the city's economic operation, the steady recovery of industries, the strong growth of new industries and new formats, the orderly progress of investment, and the gradual improvement of development expectations. Thomas Geisel, Mayor of Dusseldorf, Germany, said: "Thanks for sharing the experience from Chongqing, China. This is encouraging news and strengthens our confidence in fighting the pandemic."

In a speech on nucleic acid detection, the relevant person in charge of the Chongqing Municipal Health Commission introduced in detail the specific practices and detailed measures of how Chongqing carries out the strict and timely classification of nucleic acid detection to discover patients and to appropriately treat and reduce the mortality rate.

International friendship is closer

Chongqing and Düsseldorf established a friendship city relationship in July 2004. The two cities have closer exchanges and cooperation in the fields of economy, trade, humanities, and other fields. By participating in this webinar, it is conducive to the unity and mutual assistance of the sister cities and the level of cooperation between the two cities.

In recent years, bilateral exchanges have become closer. In February 2019, Deng Huilin, deputy mayor of Chongqing, led a delegation to pay a friendly visit to Düsseldorf. Mayor Geisel led a delegation to visit Chongqing in June 2019. During his visit to Chongqing, Geisel and his delegation also visited Chongqing Daily News Group, and received a cross-ocean joint interview by iChongqing and the German Rhine Post reporter in the new media studio, and proposed to promote the two places in the innovation and development of digital economy cooperation.