Honourable Prime Minister Mark Brown,
Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Friends,
Kia orana.
It is a great pleasure for me to be back in Rarotonga and to join you in celebrating the successful arrival of the inter-island vessel Tuitui Moana together with 5 barges. I wish to express my sincere gratitude to all those from both China and the Cook Islands who have worked tirelessly to bring this project to fruition. I would also like to extend my special thanks to Prime Minister Brown for his visionary leadership. It is thanks to his strong support that Tuitui Moana — meaning "stitches of the sea" or "threading the ocean" — has become an important bond linking the people of the Cook Islands, as well as a bond between our two countries. Let me also acknowledge the crew. You are the true heroes who have braved the waves and piloted the ship back home here in Rarotonga.
The year-long construction of Tuitui Moana bore witness to the close collaboration between China and the Cook Islands, and it has woven a deep friendship between our two peoples. Prime Minister Brown personally travelled to Wuzhou, Guangxi, to attend the vessel's keel-laying and naming ceremony, marking an important milestone for the project along the way.
Our teams have worked in close coordination, sparing no effort to ensure excellence in the building of the ship. Once in operation, the vessel will improve connectivity for the Cook Islands by facilitating the movement of people and goods between the main island and the outer islands, bringing tangible benefits particularly to outer island communities.
It is also worth noting that the electric motorcycles custom-built by China for the Cook Islands side and due to be handed over tomorrow, will enable staff to carry out community work with greater ease, while bringing a new wave of green and environmentally friendly practices to the islands. These projects stand as vivid examples of the friendship between our two countries, and as concrete manifestations of our shared commitment to practical cooperation for the benefit of our peoples.
China is a long-standing reliable partner for the Cook Islands. Over the 29 years since the establishment of diplomatic relations, our two countries have consistently upheld the principles of mutual respect, equality, and common development. China adheres to President Xi Jinping's principle of the "Four Full Respects" for island countries — fully respect their sovereignty and independence, fully respect their wills, fully respect their ethnic and cultural traditions, and fully respect their united self-empowerment.
China firmly supports the Cook Islands' right and effort to independently choose a development path suited to its national conditions, and stands ready to continue assisting the Cook Islands in achieving long-term sustainable development. Through the joint efforts of both sides, the China-Cook Islands Comprehensive Strategic Partnership continues to deepen, delivering benefits to both peoples while contributing to peace and development in the broader region.
In recent years, high-level exchanges between China and the Cook Islands have remained close, with the leaders of our two countries maintaining interactions that have injected strong momentum into the development of bilateral relations. Practical cooperation has advanced steadily across a broad range of fields, including trade, infrastructure, education and health, people-to-people exchanges, as well as marine research, conservation, and sustainable utilisation, with the breadth and depth of cooperation continuing to expand.
Whether through mutual support on international and regional affairs, or through working hand in hand to address shared challenges such as climate change and natural disasters, China and the Cook Islands have consistently demonstrated a high degree of strategic mutual trust and genuine friendship. This enduring partnership stands as a fine example of state-to-state relations founded upon equality and mutual respect. Looking ahead, China stands ready to work together with the Cook Islands to fully implement the common understandings reached between our leaders, and to advance new progress in a partnership defined by mutual respect and common development.
In closing, I wish once again to thank Prime Minister Brown for his leadership and support, and to congratulate the Cook Islands on the successful arrival of MV Tuitui Moana. May this vessel, carrying the profound friendship between our two peoples, live up to its name — "stitching the sea and threading the ocean" — and hopefully, stitch by stitch, draw ever closer the ties between the main island and the outer islands, and between the Cook Islands and China. I also wish for the Cook Islands, under the leadership of Prime Minister Brown, to enjoy progressively greater prosperity and China-Cook Islands cooperation to go from strength to strength, yielding ever more fruitful outcomes and bringing greater benefits to the people of both our nations.
Thank you.