The President of the Assembly of the Republic will carry out an official visit to China between Wednesday, April 8th and Saturday, 11th, which includes meetings with Chinese authorities in Beijing and with Portuguese communities in Shanghai, Macau and Hong Kong.
According to a note from José Pedro Aguiar-Branco’s office, this trip takes place at the invitation of the president of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China, Zhao Leji, made during his visit to Portugal in November 2024 and is part of the memorandum of understanding signed in July 2017 by the presidents of the two parliaments at the time.
The last official visit of a President of the Assembly of the Republic to China took place in 2018 (when the socialist Ferro Rodrigues held the position) and the Portuguese delegation will include deputies from the Portugal-China Parliamentary Friendship Group from various parties: Hugo Carneiro (PSD), Paulo Núncio (CDS-PP), Edite Estrela (PS), Felicidade Vital (Chega) and Paula Santos (PCP).
On Wednesday, Aguiar-Branco is scheduled to meet with the vice-president of the People’s Republic of China, Han Zheng, and with the president of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China, Zhao Leji, followed by an official dinner.
On Thursday, in Shanghai, the president of the Assembly of the Republic participates in a lunch with members of the Portuguese community, visits the Fosun Art Center, an urban planning exhibition center and meets with local authorities and the president of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of this municipality, Huang Lixin.
Friday and Saturday’s schedule will be in Macau, where Aguiar-Branco will visit Portugal’s stand at the International Tourism Exhibition (MITE) and will have meetings with the chief executive of the Macau Special Administrative Region and the president of the Legislative Assembly of this territory.
Also on Friday, Aguiar-Branco will go to the Portuguese School of Macau and, on Saturday, he will visit some emblematic places of the Portuguese presence in that region, whose administration passed from Portugal to China in 1999: the Santa Casa da Misericórdia, the ruins of São Paulo Cathedral, the Portuguese Bookstore and the Consulate General.
Meetings with the Portuguese community, including the legal community, and the inauguration of an exhibition commemorating the 25th of April, entitled “The arts are on the Street” complete the program in Macau.
On Saturday afternoon, Aguiar-Branco and the Portuguese delegation also visited the exhibition “Estórias lusas” in the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong, about the Portuguese presence in this territory, and met with members of the Portuguese community who live in this former British colony.
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