President Putin To Receive China's Vice President Hu Jintao

Russian President Vladimir Putin will receive China's Vice President Hu Jintao on Saturday. Hu Jintao is arriving in Moscow in the afternoon on a one-day working visit. Later in the day, he will have meetings with Russian leaders to discuss topical international problems and Russian-Chinese relations. They will also speak about the struggle against international terrorism. On Sunday, Hu Jintao will leave the Russian capital. Relations between Russia and China have been steadily developing. Agreements between the two countries have laid a firm foundation for bilateral ties. Russia and China have built a mechanism for permanent contacts and dialogue at all levels and established cooperation in all fields. Russian-Chinese summit meetings are now held at least once a year. President Putin last met with Chinese President Jiang Zemin on October 20 at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Shanghai. The two countries' heads of government and foreign ministers regularly meet, too. Russia and China are building their interaction on the international scene on the basis of their April 1997 Joint Declaration on a Multipolar World and the Establishment of a New International Order, signed by the two countries' presidents. Special importance is attached to their interaction in such major fields as the enhancement of the authority and role of the United Nations, the upholding of the primacy of international law in world affairs, the maintenance of strategic stability, above all the preservation of the 1972 ABM Treaty, and the establishment of a just and equitable world economic order. Russia and China have a common view on such important issues as struggle against religious extremism, national separatism and international terrorism.