Xinhua Asia-Pacific news summary at 1600 GMT, April 8

ISLAMABAD -- The Pakistani Foreign Ministry on Sunday released details of a wide ranging agreement with neighboring Afghanistan on cooperation in key areas.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani reached the agreement in their talks in Afghan capital Kabul during his visit to Afghanistan on Friday. (Pakistan-Afghanistan-Taliban)

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HANOI -- The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), a multilateral development bank, has helped many Asian countries have better infrastructure, deeper regional integration and accelerated poverty reduction, an AIIB official told Xinhua here recently in an exclusive interview.

"We have three mandates -- sustainable infrastructure, regional connectivity and private capital mobilization... As a Chinese proverb saying, "Better roads lead to better life," Supee Teravaninthorn, Director General of AIIB's Investment Operations Department, who spoke in English but pronounced the proverb in Chinese. (AIIB-Asia-China)

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TIRIN KOT, Afghanistan -- As many as 22 militants affiliated with the Taliban were killed and 10 others wounded following a series of the U.S. and NATO-led coalition's air raids in Afghanistan's southern province of Uruzgan, a statement said Sunday.

Acting on a confirmed tip-off, the operations were launched late on Saturday in Khas Uruzgan district of the province, leaving up to 22 militants dead and 10 other wounded, Afghan army Corps 205 Attal, based in the region, said in the statement. (Afghanistan-Taliban-Attack)

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SUVA -- The warehouse of Morris Hedstrom (MH), Fiji's largest wholesale and retail organisation with a chain of supermarkets and homemaker (variety) stores, is on fire on Sunday afternoon and fire-fighters are now trying hard to bring it under control.

When Xinhua correspondent rushed to the site which is located in the Walu Bay of Fiji's capital city of Suva, some police officers are standing guard while a number of fire-fighters, supported with four fire trucks, are busy trying to put out the big fire with thick black smoke rising high in the sky. (Fiji-Warehouse-Fire)

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SEOUL -- China's reform and opening-up policy has contributed to economic growth domestically and globally for the past four decades, a South Korean trade expert said.

The trade expert also expected China's further contribution to the global growth with a deepened reform and opening-up policy. (S.Korea-China-Contribution) Enditem