HANOI - Visiting Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping pledged here on Wednesday to promote healthy and steady growth of China-Vietnam ties.

Xi, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, made the remarks during talks with Le Hong Anh, a Politburo member and permanent member of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) Central Committee, and Vietnamese Vice President Nguyen Thi Doan.

Xi said his visit was aimed at implementing the important consensus reached earlier by Chinese President and General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee Hu Jintao and his CPV counterpart Nguyen Phu Trong.

In recent years, the China-Vietnam traditional friendship forged by the older generations of leaders from both sides has been deepened, especially after the two countries established a comprehensive strategic partnership of cooperation in 2008.

The two countries have continued frequent political exchanges, shared experiences of governance of the party and the country and carried out fruitful cooperation in economy and trade, military, law enforcement and safety, and other fields, Xi said.

Facing a complex and changing international situation, China and Vietnam should enhance their solidarity and deepen cooperation, Xi said. That, he said, will be conductive to the consolidation of the CPC and CPV's position as ruling parties, stability and development in each country, the socialist cause, and regional peace and development.

Xi said China is willing to work with Vietnam to promote a comprehensive strategic partnership of cooperation between the two sides from the following aspects:

-- First, strengthen strategic communications and enhance political mutual trust. China would like to continue high-level exchanges with Vietnam to cement bilateral ties and exchange views on important regional and international issues.

-- Second, enhance party-to-party exchanges and learn from each other' s experiences. The two sides should implement earnestly the five-year cooperation plan of the two parties, expand cadres training and strengthen research on major theoretical and realistic issues.

-- Third, deepen pragmatic cooperation and achieve mutual benefits and win-win progress. The two countries should work effectively to improve their level of economic and trade cooperation and gradually realize the balance of trade. The two sides should strive to boost their bilateral trade volume to $60 billion by 2015.

-- Fourth, expand people-to-people exchanges and promote China-Vietnam friendship. China hopes the two sides will further enhance cooperation in science and technology, education, culture, health and other areas, and quickly facilitate the establishment of Confucius Institute branches in Vietnam.

-- Fifth, enhance multilateral cooperation and build a harmonious world. Being developing countries, China and Vietnam share common interests and hold similar views and positions on many issues. China would like to strengthen communications and coordination with Vietnam under the frameworks including East Asia cooperation and Greater Mekong Subregion economic cooperation, work together so as to jointly maintain the interests of developing countries.

Anh fully agreed with Xi on his views of the development of bilateral relations. He said he believed that Xi's visit will contribute to the implementation of consensus reached by the general secretaries of the two parties and promote the comprehensive strategic partnership of cooperation between the two countries.

As neighbors linked by mountains and rivers, Vietnam appreciated China's support and help, and considers the Vietnam-China relationship a top priority of its foreign relations, Anh said.

Anh added that Vietnam and China should develop ties featuring "long-term stability, future-oriented, good-neighborliness and comprehensive cooperation" in the spirit of "good neighbors, good friends, good comrades and good partners." They also, he said, should continue to consolidate cooperation in such areas as politics, economomy, inter-party and people-to people exchanges.

The two sides also exchanged views on the South China Sea issue and spoke positively about the bilateral consensus and principle agreement for properly handling disputes involving the South China Sea that were reached during CPV Central Committee General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong's visit to China in October.

The two sides agreed to earnestly implement the consensus and the agreement in order to maintain stability in the South China Sea.

After the talks, the two sides also signed cooperation documents in economy and trade, health, press and other fields.

Earlier in the day, Xi visited the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and Ho Chi Minh's former residence, during which he listened to the life story of the late top Vietnamese leader (1890-1969), and his exchanges with Mao Zedong (1893-1976), Zhou Enlai (1898-1976) and other Chinese leaders from the older generation.

Xi arrived here Tuesday for a three-day official visit to Vietnam, the first leg of a two-nation Southeast Asian tour that will also take him to Thailand.