The 138th edition of the China Import and Export Fair, also known as the Canton Fair, opened in Guangzhou of south China's Guangdong Province on Wednesday, with both the number of participating companies and booths setting new records.
This fair will be divided into three phases, with each phase lasting for five days.
The first phase, running from Oct 15 to 19, focuses on advanced manufacturing, including electronic appliances and industrial equipment.
At 09:00 in the morning, purchasers from all over the world entered the venue to select new products, negotiate deals and take the pulse of the market.
According to the organizer, about 247,000 purchasers from 218 countries and regions have pre-registered for this fair, up 10 percent from the previous edition. Notably, the number of buyers from the European Union, the United States, and countries involved in the Belt and Road Initiative has shown significant growth.
A total of 74,600 booths are arranged for some 32,000 participating companies at this edition of Canton Fair. Among them, about 3,600 companies will be making their debut at the fair.
Over 10,000 participating companies are hi-tech firms, SMEs that use specialized and sophisticated technologies to produce novel and unique products or manufacturing champions for a certain sector, taking up 30 percent of the total exhibitors.
This fair set up a service robot zone, demonstrating leading embodied robots and robot dogs. The event will feature a dedicated zone for the smart healthcare industry for the first time to better showcase China's advanced products and technologies in the medical field.
138th Canton Fair opens with record number of participating companies
As the diplomatic engagement between the United States and Iran continues despite a faltering ceasefire, a former commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has said that Iran is prepared to use military power to break the U.S. maritime blockade should the negotiations collapse or run on too long.
Mohsen Rezaee, who also currently serves as a member of the Iranian Expediency Discernment Council, struck a confident tone about Iran's current trajectory in an exclusive interview with China Global Television Network (CGTN) in Tehran on Wednesday.
He said the country has withstood over two decades of crippling sanctions and continued to move forward.
"We have been under sanctions for more than 20 years. The number of sanctions likely exceeds 2,000, targeting individuals, enterprises, corporations, ships, insurance companies, and even foreign countries that interacted with us. However, we have managed to find solutions to neutralize these sanctions, and we will continue to do so moving forward," he said.
He said Iran aims to ease the sanctions burden through talks with the U.S., although at the same time, he said, Iran is ready to shift to a military response if the path to a peaceful resolution closes.
"Furthermore, we will compel the U.S. to lift these sanctions. We will force the U.S. to end the maritime blockade -- either through negotiations or, should they resist, through direct action and we will attack U.S. warships. Therefore, despite all the pressures, the future of our economy is bright and promising, while the future of the US economy is bleak," he said.
While any new war against Iran would be a dead end, the best way out for the U.S. is to continue talks, according to the senior official.
"We have prepared ourselves so that if the maritime blockade continues beyond a certain timeframe, we will launch an attack and break the blockade. The Americans have no choice but to negotiate. Continuing this war is a journey into a very dark tunnel for the United States. The more America chooses to fight, the deeper it enters a tunnel with no end. Yet for us, the path is perfectly clear. America is moving toward us in the dark, while we are monitoring their every move," he said.
Former IRGC chief says Iran ready to break U.S. naval blockade by force if talks fail
