On the morning of July 2, Chinese President Hu Jintao who was paying a visit to Russia met in the government building with Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov. The two sides mainly exchanged views on how to further expand the bilateral pragmatic cooperation in various fields and what specific measures should be taken to carry out the cooperation.

Hu told Fradkov that China-Russia strategic and coordinative partnership is witnessing continuous development and satisfactory achievements have been made in bilateral mutually beneficial cooperation in various fields. He said he had held talks with President Putin on a wide range of issues the day before. They agreed to continue to deepen bilateral political mutual trust, expand mutual support, enhance bilateral pragmatic cooperation in various fields, especially in the economic, trade, energy, humanities and military fields, and enhance coordination and support in international and regional affairs so as to safeguard the common interest of both countries, maintain world peace and promote common development.

Hu said against the backdrop of continuous development of China-Russian relations, it is a common mission for both sides to expand the bilateral pragmatic cooperation and benefit their peoples. The two countries need to regard pragmatic cooperation from a strategic perspective, carefully implement the agreements that have been reached and, constantly improve cooperation level so as to achieve mutual benefits. First, we should expand economic and trade cooperation steadily and make greater efforts in optimizing the trade mix and transforming the economic and trade growth mode. Special attention should be paid to expanding bilateral trade on mechanical and electronic products. Second, we should deepen bilateral cooperation in energy and promote the joint exploration of oil and gas resources. China supports expanding cooperation in power between the two countries and hopes Russia can ensure stable power supply and tap the Chinese market with competitive prices. Third, we should stimulate cooperation on large-scale projects with investment cooperation and actively implement investment agreements that have already been reached. At the same time we need to specify investment plans, identify investment projects and sign the investment protection agreements as soon as possible so as to ensure the sound development of investment cooperation. Fourth, we should enhance cooperation in humanities, discuss and implement the specific plans and schemes for the "Russian Year" in China in 2006 and the "Chinese Year" in Russia in 2007. Fifth, we should expand local exchanges to further encourage the border areas of the two countries to make full use of existing meeting mechanisms to enhance mutually beneficial cooperation.

Fradkov indicated the important consensus reached between President Hu and President Putin on further developing China-Russia strategic and coordinative partnership during President Hu's current visit to Russia is of great significance to promoting the comprehensive development of bilateral ties. The related government agencies of Russia will actively coordinate with China to fully implement the various decisions made by the two heads of state. He said Russia would like to enrich the content of bilateral trade, explore new areas of cooperation, optimize the trade mix and cooperation mechanism, expand mutual investment, implement the consensus reached between the two heads of state on the construction of crude oil pipelines and enhance bilateral strategic coordination on energy. Exchanges and cooperation in humanities render strong support for bilateral economic and technological cooperation. At present we should make active preparations for the upcoming activities of the Russian Year and the Chinese Year.

State Councilor Tang Jiaxuan and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov attended the meeting.

On the evening of July 1, Hu also went to the Chinese Embassy in Russia to visit the staffs of the embassy, representatives of Chinese-funded businesses, overseas Chinese in Russia and overseas Chinese students.