General Secretary Hu Jintao said in Beijing Friday the Chinese mainland has for many times extended welcome to delegations of political parties and groups in Taiwan to come for exchanges and dialogs for improvement and development of relations across the Taiwan Straits.
Hu, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said the "historic meeting" between him and Chairman Lien Chan of the Chinese Kuomintang party marked that exchanges between the two parties have entered "a new development stage" and reflected their common determination and sincerity to boost cross- Straits relations.
This common step taken by the two parties will "go down in the history of the development of cross-Straits relations," said Hu.
This is the first meeting between top leaders of the two parties in six decades.