August 29 to 30, SIIS & CIIS jointly hold “Conference on China-SAARC Relations: Towards A Closer Partnership”. SIIS President Chen Dongxiao attends the meeting and delivers the opening remarks. CIIS Vice President Dong Manyuan and Secretary-General Yang Yi respectively chair the meeting. Experts from Beijing, Shanghai, Yunnan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka have a heated discussion on how to further the people-to-people contact between China and SAARC, how to deepen China-SAARC cooperation in the framework of guidelines at SAARC.