Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang wrapped up his official visit to Russia on Monday, which was aimed at further promoting the two nations' comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination and cementing pragmatic cooperation.

Li is currently visiting Hungary, the second leg of his trip, which will also take him to Belgium and the Brussels-based European Union (EU) headquarters.

During his stay in Russia, Li held meetings with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Prime Minister and President-elect Vladimir Putin, as well as other senior officials.

Strengthening trade ties and promoting traditional friendship between the two peoples have also been highlighted during the visit.

PROMOTING ALL-AROUND COOPERATION

When meeting with Medvedev, Li hailed remarkable progress achieved by the two sides in recent years and pledged to deepen strategic mutual trust, expand all-around pragmatic cooperation, and strengthen mutual support on issues concerning each other's core interests.

"This is not only conducive to boosting world multi-polarization, but also brings real benefits to the two peoples," the Chinese vice premier said.

He called on China and Russia to cement economic cooperation, improve global governance, and facilitate communication and coordination within the framework of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Group of 20 and the BRICS bloc (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa).

During the meeting with Putin, Li urged joint efforts to bring bilateral ties to a new height.

Putin said Li's visit would further enhance the development of bilateral pragmatic cooperation in all spheres.

Li also spoke highly of exchanges between the two countries' legislative bodies and their cooperative mechanism, which played a significant role in promoting China-Russia relations and cooperation in all aspects.

MORE PRAGMATIC ECONOMIC, TRADE COOPERATION

Li's visit produced fruitful results in promoting cooperation in economic and trade areas. The two countries signed 27 trade contracts worth 15 billion U.S. dollars.

Economic and trade cooperation is an important cornerstone for the two countries' strategic partnership and serves as impetus to bilateral ties, Li said, urging both sides to increase pragmatic cooperation in all spheres to boost common development.

He encouraged state-owned enterprises of the two countries to work together in such areas as large machinery and equipment, infrastructure, energy, space, nano-technology, high-end manufacturing and bio-medicine.

The vice premier emphasized the importance of paying great attention to the quantity and quality of projects for cooperation, given the bilateral trade targets for the year 2015 and the year 2020 are set at 100 billion U.S. dollars and 200 billion dollars, respectively.

Li also put forward proposals on promoting economic and trade cooperation at local levels, including encouraging Chinese enterprises to invest in Russia, and perfecting the cooperation mechanism.

CEMENTING CHINA-RUSSIA FRIENDSHIP

During Li's meeting with the representatives of Chinese and Russian citizens, Li said the friendship between the two peoples is key to and guarantee of the sustained development of bilateral ties.

The Chinese government attaches great importance to people-to-people exchanges between the two sides and has made vigorous efforts in facilitating various friendly activities, so that the bilateral friendship could continue to expand and prosper, he said.

Li encouraged young people to carry forward the traditional friendship between the two countries and to become an important force in promoting bilateral ties.

Delivering a speech at the Moscow State University, the vice premier announced China's plan to invite 300 students from the university to visit China this summer.

During his visit, the Chinese leader also met with Russian veterans of World War II, praising their contributions to world peace.

Noting that all the veterans at the event had helped China to finally crash Japanese invaders in China's Northeast, Li said their action and blood helped win the final victory and consolidate the China-Russia friendship.

The two neighbors shall cherish their hard-won achievements, push forward their friendship and cooperation, and work together to safeguard world peace, he added.