Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi hosted the first meeting of the International Forum on COVID-19 Vaccine Cooperation via video on Thursday.

About 30 parties, including ministers from various countries, representatives of the United Nations and other international organizations and business representatives attended the meeting.

The meeting was aimed at strengthening international cooperation on vaccines and promoting the fair and equitable distribution of vaccines around the world.

Chinese President Xi Jinping announced that China aims to provide two billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to the world and offer $100 million to the COVAX project throughout the year 2021, Wang said. The plan is a part of China's global efforts in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic.

China is doing all it can to keep its promise to help share COVID-19 vaccines to the world and make it affordable and accessible to those in need, Wang added.

Wang emphasized the importance of international cooperation in the fight of COVID-19 pandemic, as the world faces insufficient vaccine production capacity and inequitable vaccine distribution.

It's vital that nations agree that COVID-19 vaccines should be public goods and countries around the world should take action to fight against "vaccine nationalism" and any act of using vaccines as a tool for geopolitics, he said.

Countries around the world should also unite to help those in need to get vaccines through technology transfer and cooperative production, Wang said.

To strengthen global efforts in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, China has taken the lead in sharing the entire gene sequence of the COVID-19 with the world. It has also conducted phase III clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccines overseas, in addition to providing vaccines to developing countries, and in cooperating with developing countries in vaccine production.

Wang also said China has donated and continued to donate COVID-19 vaccine to more than 100 countries, has exported more than 770 million doses of vaccines to more than 60 countries, the most of any nation in the world.

China's move in promoting international cooperation in vaccines has no political purpose or economic interest. There has never been any political conditions attached to its donations, Wang added.

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