The Chinese government always attaches great importance to education cooperation and exchanges with European and GUS countries as well as the European Union as an independent entity. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, this area has witnessed the most vigorous development of China's international education cooperation and exchanges. With unstinting support from the governments, the scale and scope of cooperation and exchanges has been significantly expanded and remarkable achievements have been scored.

So far, China has established education cooperation and exchanges with 41 countries in this area as well as the European Union. It has signed education agreements with 23 countries within this area. In addition, agreements on mutual recognition of academic degrees with eight East European and GUS countries have been endorsed.

In April 2002 and February 2004, the Chinese government signed Agreement on Equivalence of Academic Degrees in Higher Education with the government of Germany and Agreement on Mutual Recognition of Academic Degrees in Higher Education with the government of UK respectively. Currently, China is actively pushing forward the progress of mutual recognition of academic degrees with other European Countries.

Besides tradition forms of cooperation such as the exchange of students, cooperative research among scholars, mutual exchange of delegations, international conferences and the exchange of education materials, future cooperation with European countries will be mainly carried out in the form of cooperative programs.