BEIJING (Reuters) - China and Colombia have signed a joint cooperation plan on the Belt and Road Initiative, state media said on Wednesday after their leaders met in Beijing.

Burgeoning commerce in recent years has helped grow Beijing's influence in Latin America and the Caribbean, a region of strategic significance for the United States.

China is Colombia's second largest trading partner after the United States, which it recently displaced as Colombia's largest source of imports.

China is ready to import more high-quality products from Colombia, back its firms in investing and doing business there and join in infrastructure construction, President Xi Jinping told counterpart Gustavo Petro, the Xinhua news agency said.

On Monday Petro said Colombia would join the Belt and Road Initiative launched by Xi in 2013 to recreate the ancient Silk Road and build China's trade and infrastructure links with the world.

More than 20 Latin American nations are among the more than 150 countries participating in the programme, but in February Panama said it was exiting from the pact, a move China blamed on pressure from the United States.

Petro, who took over in August 2022, made his first trip to China as president in October 2023, upgrading to a strategic partnership two-way ties first established in 1980.