Top Chinese leader meets SCO heads of state

BEIJING, June 5 (www.tingvoa.com) -- Intensive diplomatic meetings between the top leader of China and visiting central Asian nations occupied the Great Hall of People Tuesday in Beijing less than a day ahead of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit.

The China-Russia relationship has maintained a positive, healthy and stable momentum 1 of development over the recent years with the two sides' joint 2 efforts, said Chinese President Hu Jintao while meeting his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin Tuesday afternoon.

Putin's current visit is his first to China during his third term as Russian president.

Prior to the meeting, Hu held a red-carpet welcoming ceremony for Putin inside the building housing China's legislature -- the National People's Congress.

The Chinese president said China would like to work with the Russian side in deepening all-round cooperation, cementing friendship, and enhancing strategic coordination 3 in handling international and regional affairs, so to better promote common development and safeguard the international community.

Currently, both China and Russia are committed to adjusting their economic structure, said Hu, adding that the two nations should give full play to the strong complementarity of the two economies to promote trade connections.

He urged the two countries to closely cooperate in such areas as energy, further processing of resources, electro-mechanical manufacturing, high-tech 5 and innovation, as well as cross-border infrastructure 6 construction.

The Chinese president also said the two sides should expand people-to-people and cultural cooperation, and make an action plan for the next 10 years with an emphasis on youth exchanges.

China and Russia have effectively preserved their common interests and will promote peace, security and stability in the region and around the world in working with each other to deal with international and regional affairs, said Hu.

He also said the two countries should strengthen their cooperation within the UN, the SCO, the BRICS group and the Group of 20 nations to safeguard the UN Charter and principles, as well as the ground rules of international relations, promote the unity 4 and cooperation among emerging economies and the developing countries, and shape a more just and reasonable world political and economic order.

Putin said the two countries' comprehensive partnership 7 of strategic coordination has reached an unprecedented 8 level through the efforts of both sides.

He said the two sides share extensive common interests and high-level strategic mutual 9 trust. Bilateral 10 cooperation in trade, technology and culture has been quite fruitful, he added.

The Russian side is confident that the two nations can achieve the goal for bilateral trade to reach 100 billion U.S. dollars in 2015 and 200 billion dollars in 2020, said the Russian leader.

In 2011, bilateral trade volume reached 80 billion U.S. dollars, a record high showing a 42.7-percent year-on-year rise.

Putin said the Russian side hopes to coordinate 11 with the Chinese side more closely to push ahead with key projects and improve the structure of bilateral cooperation.

Before the formal talks, Hu and Putin held a closed-door meeting on some major issues. The two leaders also attended the signing ceremony of a number of cooperation agreements and met the press after the meeting.

Also on Tuesday, the Chinese president met with his Tajik counterpart Emomali Rahmon and Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev.