China hopes that the talks with Pakistan and other regional countries will lead to trading bloc in Asia. Prospects of free trade in Asia are promising as a dazzlingly complicated network of free trade deals are expanding. According to the experts in Beijing, nations on the continent have signed dozens of agreements about bilateral or multilateral free trade agreements (FTA) and they are in talks for more. Asia's three biggest economies - China, Japan and the Republic of Korea (RoK) are all in respective talks with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) about Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
What is more exciting is that the respective FTA deals the three countries are involved in might end up in a trade bloc that includes the three of them as well as ASEAN countries.
Experts mandated by governments earlier this week have begun a study looking at the building of a free trade area that covers the 13 nations.
Between East Asia and South Asia, China and Pakistan have started FTA negotiations; China and India also pledged to build a FTA.
"I believe Pakistan and China will be very accommodating to each other in the FTA talks because of good relations between the two countries," said a Pakistani official.
"Pakistan will respect China's needs, and China will also respect ours. The negotiations will not be difficult," he added.
Chen Chao, an official with the International Trade Department of China's Ministry of Commerce, also said the relationship between the two nations is a very favourable factor for the FTA talks.
In economic terms, it would not be hard to obtain a win-win deal, he said.
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