China and Singapore signed on Thursday an agreement to strengthen cooperation and exchanges between the archival institutions of the two countries.

Under the agreement, which was inked by China's State Archives Administration Director-General Yang Dongquan and his Singaporean counterpart Pitt Kuan Wah, the two institutions will carry out academic exchanges on archives acquisition, management, reproduction, application of information technology and vocational training.

While exchanging academic materials and publications published by both parties, they will also promote reciprocal exchange of collections or duplicates of archives materials, facilitate access to archival resources for researchers, publish compilations of archival materials and hold seminars and exhibitions on mutual themes.

It is the third time for both sides to sign such an agreement since the first such agreement was inked in 2000.

Both Yang and Pitt voiced their satisfaction with the cooperation between the two institutions over the past years, and they also believed that the new agreement will further strengthen such cooperation in the years to come.

(Xinhua News Agency July 18, 2008)