BEIJING, April 15. /TASS/. China and Russia continue to step up cooperation in scientific field as the potential of interaction is huge, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said on Friday.

"As far as we know, China and Russia continue to develop regular cooperation in the scientific field, this is an important component of Sino-Russian cooperation," he said at a briefing, answering a question from TASS whether it is true that Chinese partners have "put on pause" cooperation with Russia in the scientific field, and how China's foreign ministry assesses the development of cooperation between the two countries in the relevant field, "We have achieved fruitful results in this area, <...> which shows that there is a huge potential for cooperation."

The Chinese diplomat said that in 2022 Beijing and Moscow "have always maintained optimal scientific contacts". He recalled that in 2020 and 2021, China and Russia's cross cooperation in innovation, science and technology was successful as well.

"This was a new milestone for our bilateral cooperation in science," Zhao Lijian stressed.

President of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) Alexander Sergeyev said on Thursday that partners from China "put on pause" cooperation with the RAS, freezing the development of previously discussed projects. He added that in any case "we will have to return to normal cooperation and try to keep what we have where we can keep it".