The Macedonian Government delegation which attends the summit between China and 16 European countries in Riga met on Sunday with representatives of the Chinese Fund for Central and Eastern Europe. Between 50 and 500 million EUR will be made available for infrastructure development and other public projects, as well as for private sector projects.

Prime Minister Emil Dimitriev and Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Peshevski discussed the available opportunities with the Fund, which will operate out of Munich and Hong Kong, and will have up to 10 billion EUR by next year.

"One of the main points from the summit on Saturday was the creation of this Fund which will support projects in European countries. We are in contact with its representatives and they detailed the structure of their organization and the conditions under which they will support projects. From what he could hear, it is really an interesting and favorable program and it will also cover operations of private companies. We agreed for a follow up meeting with more detailed presentations", said Dimitriev, adding that he was assured that the Fund would move quickly to make its reserves operational.

Deputy Prime Minister Peshevski added that the Fund will have a limit of at least 50 million EUR per project, and has absolutely reasonable expectations on the return of investment, which would make it very competitive in the type of projects it will pursue. "The Fund will also offer partnership opportunities with private companies, mainly from Asia, who want to access other markets, so overall we will see a solid opening of perspectives for our companies", said Peshevski.