Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro (C) and Costa Rica's President Luis Guillermo Solis listen to President Xi Jinping speak at the opening ceremony of the 1st Ministerial Meeting of China-CELAC Forum at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing Jan 8, 2015. [Photo/Agencies]

BEIJING - China's relations with Latin America and Africa ushered in a new era of win-win cooperation in 2015, which have become a paradigm for South-South cooperation and helped build a more multilateral world.

The upgrade of such relations is represented by two summits held respectively in the beginning and the end of this year.

On Jan 8-9, the first ministerial meeting of the forum of China and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) was held in Beijing, marking the start of a new era that features all-round cooperation between the two sides.

On Dec 4-5, the second summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) was held in Johannesburg, South Africa, sending a strong message to the entire world that China and Africa are further striving for win-win cooperation and common development.

China-Latin America cooperation

The first China-CELAC forum ministerial meeting has shown that the comprehensive cooperation between China and Latin America has come true and the China-Latin America relations have entered a new phase that features the common development and mutual promotion of bilateral and all-round cooperation, Yin Hengmin, special representative of the Chinese government on Latin American affairs, said at a seminar held in November in Shanghai.

"The China-CELAC forum has yielded delightful early results, which has laid a solid basis for the long-term development of the all-round cooperation between China and Latin America," Yin said.

At the first China-CELAC forum ministerial meeting, China and CELAC agreed on three major documents -- a five-year cooperation plan, the Beijing Declaration and the Regulations on China-CELAC forum.

The plan (2015-2019) contains specific measures for overall cooperation between China and Latin America, covering politics, security, trade, investment, finance, infrastructure, energy, resources, industry, agriculture, science and people-to-people exchanges.

Among them, on the political front, China will invite 1,000 political party leaders from CELAC members to visit China.

Both sides will strive to achieve a trade volume of 500 billion US dollars and investment of at least 250 billion dollars within a decade.