John Lee highlights Hong Kong’s global role to Premier Li Qiang as expo opens

Hong Kong’s leader has highlighted the city’s global competitiveness and its “superconnector” role between mainland China and overseas markets to Chinese Premier Li Qiang as the world’s largest import trade show opened in Shanghai.

Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu showed the state leader around the Hong Kong exhibition area at the eighth China International Import Expo (CIIE) on Wednesday.

Themed “a brilliant new chapter of connectivity between the mainland and the world”, the exhibition area reflected Hong Kong’s dual advantages of having national and global opportunities under the “one country, two systems” governing principle and the international rankings the city had achieved, the government said.

Li pledged at the opening of the annual six-day expo to further open up the mainland’s robust consumer market to international business following a landmark Sino-US deal last week to resolve trade disputes.

Hong Kong’s chief executive led a city delegation to attend the opening ceremony and related events.