On April 1, 2009, Chinese President Hu Jintao met with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in London. Both sides reached broad consensus on tackling the international financial crisis, promoting the reform of the world financial system and enhancing bilateral relations.

Hu said the upcoming London G20 summit, as a follow-up to last November's meeting in Washington, brings together world leaders to discuss measures to tackle the financial crisis. It is of great importance for boosting confidence of the people and businesses, stabilizing the world financial market and reviving global economic growth.

With the international financial market still in turbulence, the world financial crisis continues to spread and go deeper and is taking a heavier toll of the world's real economy, Hu noted. It is a daunting challenge for the international community to cope with the crisis and strive for a recovery of the world economy, the Chinese president said. "All countries across the world are on a same boat of world economy, and all on board must work together to fight against the current difficulties," he said. "Only through joint efforts can the boat sail through the financial turmoil safe and sound, and the negative effect of the financial crisis be reduced to the minimum and an early recovery of world economy is made possible."

During the meeting, Hu made a four-point proposal to address the complicated and volatile international economic situation. First, to stabilize the international financial market as quickly as possible, give effective play to the driving role of the financial sector in the real economy and boost the confidence of the people and enterprises; second, to take economic stimulus measures in line with the reality of each country, strengthen macroeconomic policy coordination between and among countries, and secure development, employment and people’s livelihood; third, to strive to restrain trade and investment protectionism and reduce the damages caused by the crisis to the world, particularly to developing countries; fourth, to promote necessary reforms on the international financial system in a comprehensive, balanced, progressive and effective principle and avoid the recurrence of similar crises. China appreciates and supports the positive measures Britain has taken to combat the financial crisis, and will continue to assume a responsible attitude to work with Britain and other G20 members so that the London summit will yield positive results, said the Chinese president.

Hu said the financial crisis fully reflected the deficiency of the current economic and financial system, particularly its failure to manage risks and solve problems accumulated in the process of economic globalization. "It has become the consensus of the international community to reform the world's economic and financial governance structure so as to provide a sound system that can guarantee a long-term and stable world economic development," Hu said. He called for efforts to implement the important consensus reached at last November's meeting in Washington and establish a new international financial order that is fair, just, inclusive and orderly.

Brown said he hoped the summit would boost the confidence of the international community, help resolve the existing problems in the world economy and play a role in reviving the global economy. He said he was convinced that with the joint efforts of Britain, China and other countries present at the summit, the summit would make substantive progress in stabilizing the international financial market, stimulating world economic growth, reforming international financial institutions, and helping emerging economies and developing countries. Britain supports replenishing the resources of the International Monetary Fund, expanding capital liquidity and reforming the governance structure of international financial institutions, Brown said.

The two leaders also discussed bilateral relations. Substantial progress in bilateral ties has been made in recent years thanks to the joint efforts of both sides, Hu said. China attaches great importance to developing relations with Britain, regarding China-Britain ties as one of the most important bilateral relationships between large countries, he said. To advance bilateral ties, Hu said both sides should deal with bilateral relations from a strategic perspective and strengthen communication and coordination on issues concerning the long-term development of the world in the 21st century. The president said both countries should adhere to the right course of bilateral ties and bring into full play such mechanisms as the China-UK economic and financial dialogue, Task Forces and strategic dialogue. Hu also called for substantive cooperation in all fields with Britain and increased bilateral trade and investment to achieve the goal of a bilateral trade volume of 60 billion U.S. dollars in 2010. He said both sides should keep the overall bilateral relations in mind, and respect and handle appropriately issues that concern each other's core interests.

Brown hailed the sound development of bilateral relations, saying that Britain cherishes the comprehensive strategic partnership and friendship with China. He said that despite the impacts of the international financial crisis, Britain still expects to make its utmost efforts to meet the bilateral trade target. He said Britain will continue holding dialogues with China on climate change and other major issues.

Both sides also exchanged views on international and regional issues.

Wang Qishan, Ling Jihua, Wang Huning and Dai Bingguo attended the meeting.