Shanghai Mayor Han Zheng yesterday met a delegation led by Vicente Loscertales, the secretary general of International Expositions Bureau (BIE) and Wu Jianmin, president of BIE at the Hengshan Hotel.

Loscertales visited Shanghai four times last year which gave“our work in preparing for World Expo 2010 enormous help," Han said.

"Shanghai will speed up its preparation work in 2007, attracting more participants and pushing the pace of construction at the Expo Site and moving theme developing into a new phase," Han said.

He promised that the organisers would work hard with the BIE's help.

Loscertales and Wu Jianmin thanked Han for his hospitality and said they highly appreciated the city's preparations for World Expo 2010.

They said BIE would further cooperate with the organisers in the work this year.

Vice Mayor Yang Xiong and Zhong Yanqun, standing deputy director of the World Expo 2010 Shanghai Executive Committee, and Hua Junduo, commissioner general for World Expo 2010, member of the Organising Committee of the Expo 2010 Shanghai China, attended the meeting with the delegation.