On April 23, 2006, Chinese President Hu Jintao met with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince & Prime Minister Sultan Bin Abdul-Aziz in Riyadh.

Hu indicated that Saudi Arabia is an important country in the Middle East and Gulf region and has made positive contributions to safeguarding regional peace and stability, promoting unity of Arab states, and advancing development of Gulf regional integration. China commits to developing strategic cooperative relations with Saudi Arabia and would like to strengthen political exchanges and mutual trust, conduct economic mutually beneficial cooperation for common development and respect and draw lessons from each other in the cultural area. He believed that with joint efforts of both sides, bilateral relations will surely witness greater development, bring benefits to both peoples and contribute to world peace, stability and development.

Sultan said that both peoples are peace-loving and Saudi Arabia-China relationship is a model for state-to-state relations. President Hu's current visit is an important measure for implementing consensus between the heads of state of the two countries on development of bilateral ties and has strongly pushed for bilateral cooperation in all areas. Saudi Arabia hopes that both countries will continuously strengthen cooperation in the areas of economy, trade and science & technology.

On the same day, Hu met with Emir of Eastern Region Muhammad Bin Fahd in Dammam, the second largest port city of Saudi Arabia, and visited the oil company Saudi Aramco.

Hu arrived in Dammam for a visit by special plane from Riyadh on the afternoon of the same day.