On April 27, 2006, Chinese President Hu Jintao arrived in Nairobi, capital of Kenya, for a state visit to this East African country, which is aimed at pushing for further development of bilateral friendly cooperative relations.

This is the first state visit to Kenya by President Hu. During the visit, he will hold talks with President Mwai Kibaki to jointly plan the direction for future development of bilateral ties.

President Hu will also visit the United Nations Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat) and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), and meet with officials in charge of these two agencies.

Kenya is an important country in East Africa. Since the establishment of diplomatic ties in 1963, bilateral relations have been developing smoothly. In August 2005, President Kibaki paid a state visit to China. The Kenyan government adheres to the one-China policy and both countries have maintained close consultations and coordination in international affairs.

Bilateral economic and trade cooperation has been expanded. In 2005, bilateral trade volume reached 475 million US dollars, an increase of 29.7% over the same period of the previous year. Mutually beneficial cooperation between both sides has scored remarkable achievements and by the end of June 2005, the project contracts signed by China in Kenya had totaled a value of 830 million US dollars with a turnover of 780 million US dollars. According to the statistics, nearly 10,000 Chinese tourists visited Kenya last year.

Hu arrived in Nairobi from Abuja after concluding his state visit to Nigeria. Kenya is the last leg of his current tour. Prior to that, he also visited the United States, Saudi Arabia and Morocco.