China supports the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to take a leading role in the process of promoting east Asian cooperation, said Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai.

Cui made the remarks on Wednesday in a briefing on Premier Wen Jiabao's attendance to a series of summits to be held from Dec. 11 to 14 and Wen's official visit to the host country, when asked whether the United States would be involved in the upcoming summits.

These summits would mainly involve the ASEAN, China, Japan and the Republic of Korea.

Cui said the current reality of east Asian cooperation is driven by the common needs of all countries within the region and is in the interest of all of them.

Cui said China respected the ASEAN which has been playing a leading role in the east Asian cooperation process and hoped it could continue to play such a role.

Cui noted the U.S. is a very important country, an important cooperative partner for east Asian countries, which has close relationship with them and has its own reasonable concern and interests in this region, adding that "we are fully aware of this point."

Cui stressed the east Asian cooperation is open and not exclusive and we welcome other countries outside the region to strengthen cooperation and exchange with the inside countries.

Cui said he believed different types of cooperation should complement rather than exclude each other.

Relevant parties including the U.S. should see clear that the east Asian cooperation has made substantive progress in recent years, Cui added.

Editor: Donald