Indonesian President Joko Widodo (R) shakes hands with Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte at the Presidential Palace in Jakarta, Indonesia, Nov. 23, 2016. Indonesian President Joko Widodo on Wednesday held talks with visiting Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte, discussing bilateral ties and ways to further expand cooperation in trade, investment, water management and maritime infrastructure. (Xinhua/Agung Kuncahya B.)
JAKARTA, Nov. 23 (Xinhua) -- Indonesian President Joko Widodo on Wednesday held talks with visiting Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte, discussing bilateral ties and ways to further expand cooperation in trade, investment, water management and maritime infrastructure.
During the official visit to Indonesia, the Netherlands premier was accompanied by several ministers and around 200 Dutch businessmen who are expected to build up partnership with Indonesian counterparts.
After their bilateral talks, Widodo and Rutte witnessed signings of several Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) documents between Dutch delegation and their Indonesian counterparts.
"It shows great trust and commitments from Dutch government and private sector to further enhance cooperation with Indonesia," President Widodo said in a joint press conference held after the signing ceremony.
The president said relations between Indonesia and the Netherlands has been very close and continues to improve.
Rutte said Indonesia is one of the Netherlands strategic partners with two-way trade reaching 3.2 billion euro (3.4 billion U.S. dollars) last year.
"I expect that we can further explore more cooperation as there are many potentialities from the partnership that we can work on," Rutte said.