The World Bank welcomes the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and will closely cooperate with the China-proposed institution, World Bank Managing Director Sri Mulyani Indrawati said Sunday.

"Any new initiative that will mobilize funding in order to fill infrastructure gap is certainly welcome. World Bank really welcomes the AIIB initiative," Indrawati told Xinhua in an exclusive interview.

She dismissed worries that the AIIB will compete against World Bank or existing regional development banks, saying that the global need of infrastructure is huge and the market is large enough.

"What's important is whether you are going to be able to match the funding with the need of infrastructure," said Indrawati.

"We will definitely open for cooperation with AIIB. Even now, we are working very closely in the beginning and looking at the setting, principle and framework of this institution," she said.

She said World Bank will work to support and make sure that AIIB can live up to the expectation of many countries in the world who really want to see infrastructure to develop in a better and sustainable way.

"By working with us, it's going to show and prove that they (AIIB) are adopting the same principle like other international institutions, for example, like World Bank," said Indrawati.

The AIIB aims to become an international financial institution providing support to infrastructure projects in Asia, and is expected to be established by the end of this year.

The bank has had 27 prospective founding members. Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and Switzerland have applied to join the AIIB as a founding member.

(Xinhua News Agency March 22, 2015)