hungry China is keen for part of Russia's oil industry, wants access to a Russian pipeline being built to the Pacific Coast and has helped to finance the state firm that bought the main asset of oil firm YUKOS. Beijing and Moscow also share interests in fighting mainly Muslim separatists in their rebel areas of Xinjiang and Chechnya and both seek to counter U.S. hegemony. "I'm happy to say that our plans to launch bilateral consultations in the security sphere are being implemented," said Putin, saying new mechanisms had been agreed. "Our relations in the political, economic and security spheres have been developing intensively." A military relationship between the two countries has been blossoming. Russia is China's main supplier of arms, and Chinese purchases made up a large part of Russia's $6 billion of arms sales last year. The two countries are due to hold military exercises in late summer. Tang also held talks with Igor Ivanov, a former foreign minister who is now head of Putin's security council, and with members of the government. Tang said President Hu Jintao would come to Moscow for celebrations to mark the end of World War Two, in what will be the two presidents' third meeting in one of their capitals since the beginning of last year.
