Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit to Russia last week was very successful and of "significant importance," said Konstantin Vnukov, director of the first Asian department at the Russian Foreign Ministry on Wednesday.

During the three-day state visit from March 26 to 28, Hu and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin held talks and signed a joint statement on ways to further develop the Sino-Russian strategic partnership of cooperation.

The two heads of states also took part in the opening ceremony of the "Year of China in Russia" and a Chinese National Exhibition.

"The Year of China in Russia, as well as the Year of Russia in China marked in 2006, are both comprehensive and great events which covered various fields ranging from politics, economy to social and cultural aspects," Vnukov told Xinhua.

"Russia has never held such a large-scale event with any other country," said the official, who is in charge of Russia-China relations in the ministry.

He spoke highly of the Chinese show after the opening ceremony of the "Year of China in Russia," saying Russian TV audiences learnt about the unique Chinese culture via a live broadcast of the event, which involves dance, acrobatics, duetto, Shaolin Kong Fu and Beijing Opera.

The Chinese National Exhibition held in Moscow also attracted much interest from the Russians.

The exhibition, which started on March 27 and is sponsored by the Ministry of Commerce of China, covers over 30 industries from energy to home appliances. More than 15,000 products were exhibited in an area of 20,000 square meters at the Crocus-expo center.

The four-day exhibition attracted more than 86,000 Russian visitors and the trade volume of agreements signed on the sideline of the event reached 4.9 billion U.S. dollars, according to figures from the Chinese Ministry of Commerce.

"The marking of theme years in both Russia and China were aimed at enhancing mutual-understanding between the two peoples, especially the youth," Vnukov said.

"No political problems were existing in the Russia-China ties," he said, suggesting the two sides to expand substantial cooperation in trade, economy, investment and to jointly explore the market in other countries.

Source: Xinhua