Chinese President Hu Jintao (L) shakes hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin during their meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia, July 17, 2006. (Xinhua Photo)

Chinese President Hu Jintao met in  ST. PETERSBURG, Russia on Monday(July 17) with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The two leaders exchanged views on deepening bilateral ties as well as major international and regional issues, according to Chinese officials.

Hu congratulated Putin on successfully hosting the outreach session of the G8 summit, saying that the meeting is of vital significance to facilitate the relations between the North and the South, promote multilateralism and to tackle the common challenges across the globe.

Putin said Hu has contributed a lot to the outreach session of the G8 summit, adding that Hu's participation is of vital importance to this summit.

During their meeting, Hu and Putin called for more cooperation in energy between China and Russia.

Hu said that energy cooperation between the two countries is facing vital opportunities for development.

He said that both countries are implementing the energy diversification strategy and they can complement each other in various aspects. "There is a great potential and bright prospects for both countries to undertake cooperation on energy," he said.

The Chinese president said that some major progress has been achieved on bilateral energy cooperation and that he hoped both sides would make concerted efforts to implement major energy cooperation projects.

Putin hailed energy cooperation between Russia and China, adding that substantial achievements have been scored in this field.

He said the the Russian side would take further measures to actively promote economic cooperation with China, especially in energy.

The two presidents also discussed the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue, calling for an early resumption of the six-party talks to resolve this issue.

The two leaders urged various sides to view the issue from the perspective of safeguarding peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and in the Northeast Asian region at large, demonstrate flexibility and resume the six-party talks as soon as possible.

The two presidents also urged various sides to make concerted efforts to realize the goal of making the Korean Peninsula free of nuclear weapons through dialogues.

On the relations between the two countries, Hu said currently the Sino-Russia relationship has kept the momentum of smooth expansion.

Leaders from both countries have exchanged frequent visits and progress has been made in a wide range of fields like economic cooperation, science and technology and culture, Hu said.

The Chinese president said "the Year of Russia" in China has deepened bilateral friendship and cooperation.

He added that China would actively make preparations on "the Year of China" to be staged in Russia next year.

The Chinese president vowed to strengthen the strategic coordination on major international and regional issues and hoped the two countries would continue to play a vital role in safeguarding world and regional peace and stability.

Putin said that the bilateral trade and economic cooperation has seen good momentum.

He pledged to conduct more coordination and cooperation with China in finding solutions to major international and regional issues in the future.

Editor: Donald