Rescuers in China's flood-affected Hebei and Beijing are ramping up recovery efforts to restore power, clear roads and deliver essential supplies to residents displaced by flash floods and landslides triggered by rainstorms in the mountainous outskirts.
In Xinglong County of north China's Hebei Province, firefighters and armed police officers have worked day and night to restore the roads connecting villages impacted by the disaster. The traffic to Xiangshuihu Village, one of the hardest-hit areas, was restored by Friday noon.
Rescuers in the county evacuated more than 200 villagers to a local middle school on Friday to avoid the rainstorm predicted for the following four days.
"Our houses were washed away. We lost our home and our food. Without a house, we couldn't live. We stayed at the home of a village head for several days before being evacuated to the middle school here," said Song Ping, an evacuated villager.
In the adjacent city of Beijing, rescuers have successfully restored power, communications and water supply to all flood-affected administrative villages by Saturday.
Search operations for missing people are continuing in Huairou, Miyun and Pinggu districts, with emergency teams verifying records village by village.
Meanwhile, as of Friday lunchtime, displaced residents in nine districts who were relocated had returned home, leaving 10,876 people from seven other districts still housed in 155 temporary shelters.
Traffic, power systems resume in flood-affected villages of Hebei, Beijing
China will take further steps to expand high-standard opening-up and create a new landscape of win-win cooperation in 2026, which marks the start of the 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-2030), Commerce Minister Wang Wentao said in a recent interview with China Media Group.
Wang said opening up and cooperation for mutual benefit are integral to Chinese modernization. This year, China will actively expand voluntary opening up.
The country will steadily open up such areas as value-added telecommunications, biotechnology and wholly foreign-owned hospitals, while accelerating comprehensive pilot and demonstration programs for expanded opening-up in the services sector, he noted.
"We will expand the scope and regions of unilateral opening-up and ensure the implementation of zero-tariff treatment on 100 percent of tariff lines for all African countries that have diplomatic relations with China. We will vigorously promote the effective implementation of policies for special customs operations of the Hainan Free Trade Port, further enhance the level of trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, optimize the regional layout and coverage of pilot free trade zones, and support these zones in carrying out more robust institutional opening-up trials in areas such as market access, environmental standards and government procurement, so as to better leverage their role as comprehensive pilot platforms for reform and opening-up," said Wang.
Wang said China will promote the orderly planning of cross-border industrial and supply chains.
Efforts will be made to deepen economic and trade cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative, enhance integration and connectivity across production and supply chains, and encourage cooperation in areas including green development, the digital economy, green minerals, new infrastructure and new energy so as to help build global production and supply chain partnerships that are equal, inclusive and constructive, he noted.
"We will give play to the platform role of overseas economic and trade cooperation zones, expand overseas marketing networks and explore international markets through outward investment, achieve mutual promotion between investment and trade, and advance the integrated development of trade and investment. We will also improve the overseas comprehensive service system and the national-level overseas comprehensive service platform," said the minister.
In addition, China will participate constructively in global economic governance, according to the minister.
In 2026, Wang said, China will pursue flexible and pragmatic approaches to negotiate trade and investment agreements with more willing countries and regions, while strengthening economic and trade cooperation under multilateral frameworks such as BRICS, G20 and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, to further promote mutual benefit and win-win outcomes.
China to expand high-standard opening-up to foster win-win cooperation: minister
