Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on Monday visited the National Stadium in Beijing, a showpiece venue for the 2008 Olympic Games that is under construction, saying it is "a great project."

China's President Hu Jintao (R) greets Algeria's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika at the opening ceremony of the China-Africa Summit at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing November 4, 2006.[Reuters]

The reason why he came to visit the site was to feel on the spot the greatness and stylishness of the project, the contractor of which has signed a 6-billion-U.S.dollar deal on an Algerian express way, he said.

"Maybe we cannot call the stadium a wonder, but I feel it just right to describe the project as great," said the president, who joined leaders and senior officials from 48 African nations over the weekend for the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).

The 91,000-seat stadium, which will host the opening and closing ceremonies and athletics events at the 2008 Games, costs 3. 13 billion yuan (about US$393 million). The construction is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2007.

The president also visited the Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., a leading telecommunications technology provider, in Beijing on Monday, saying he hopes Chinese companies can speed up telecommunications cooperation with their Algerian counterparts.

Algeria hopes to establish long-term cooperation with Huawei, said Bouteflika, adding his country is willing to become a technological center of the company in North Africa as a Huawei training center is to be established by the end of this year in Algeria.

The two-day FOCAC Beijing Summit, an unprecedented high-profile gathering between Chinese and African leaders, concluded Sunday after a declaration and an action plan for 2007-2009 had been adopted