Chinese president arrives in Athens for state visit

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-11-24 19:28

ATHENS - Chinese President Hu Jintao flew into Athens Monday for a state visit to Greece, which aims to push forward the China-Greece comprehensive strategic partnership.

During the visit, President Hu will meet Greek leaders on strengthening the comprehensive strategic partnership between China and Greece.

Since China and Greece established diplomatic ties 36 years ago, bilateral relations have developed smoothly. In January 2006, the two countries agreed to forge a comprehensive strategic partnership.

Since then, the Sino-Greek relationship has entered a new development stage. The two countries have maintained frequent high-level exchanges, deepened mutual political trust and expanded economic and trade cooperation.

In 2007, the two-way trade was recorded at US$3.4 billion, an increase of 49 percent over the previous year.

In June this year, Greek President Karolos Papoulias visited China and had talks with President Hu. The two sides reached broad consensus on further expanding exchanges and cooperation in all areas and deepening the China-Greece comprehensive strategic partnership.

Prior to the visit to Greece, the last leg of his five-nation trip, the Chinese leader attended the G20 summit on financial markets and the world economy in Washington and paid state visits to Costa Rica, Cuba and Peru.