CHINA yesterday welcomed the consensus reached at the European Union's summit to tackle the eurozone debt crisis and supported measures taken by the bloc that could help the region's recovery.

China, with big holdings of European sovereign debt, is one of the main bystanders waiting to see if Europe can provide debt relief for Greece, which risks a default that could trigger a deeper crisis in Italy and other eurozone economies.

In a phone conversation with French President Nicolas Sarkozy yesterday, President Hu Jintao said he hopes Europe's deal to tackle the sovereign debt crisis will help the region's economic recovery, China's state television reported.

"China hopes all these new measures will help stabilize the European financial market and conquer the current difficulties and promote economic recovery and development," Hu said.

China hopes the G20 summit in France early next month can send a strong signal on promoting robust and balanced global growth, he said.

"We hope that this consensus ... is conducive to boosting market confidence," said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu. "China is willing to make joint efforts to preserve the global economic recovery and growth."

China is also ready to increase cooperation with the EU in areas of investment, trade and finance, she added.

"China supports the measures taken by the EU to deal with the debt crisis problem," Jiang said.