Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan touch down at Vnukovo International Airport outside Moscow on Friday. Russia is the first leg of Xi's four-nation trip, which will also take him to Tanzania, South Africa and the Republic of the Congo. Photo: AFP" src="http://www.globaltimes.cn/Portals/0/attachment/2011/583691ee-29aa-4934-82da-3f93cb78c071.jpeg">

Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday held talks with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Moscow, and signed a raft of documents on cooperation between the two countries.

Xi's Moscow trip, the first by the new top Chinese leader since taking office last week, indicates that China places great importance on its ties with Russia. In a statement issued at the airport upon his arrival, Xi said developing Sino-Russian relations would be a priority of China's foreign policy.

Xi, who arrived in Russia accompanied by wife Peng Liyuan, said he was eager to boost "strategic cooperation" with Putin at the Kremlin talks, AFP reported.

According to Reuters, Xi told Putin, "I get the impression that you and I always treat each other with an open soul, our characters are alike.

"We always speak in a good manner, you and I are good friends," he added.

"We are grateful for your decision to make your first foreign trip to our country," Putin said. "Russian-Chinese ties are an important factor of international politics."

AFP quoted experts as saying that the two leaders will use the visit to map out a cooperation plan for the coming decade.

Politically, the West has speculated that Beijing is forging a growing alliance with Moscow as a geopolitical counterweight to Washington's pivot to Asia.

However, Evgeny Tomikhin, minister counselor of the Russian embassy in Beijing, rejected such claims, saying that Russia and China wouldn't forge such an "alliance."

"We have developed a strategic cooperative partnership. It's not an alliance, but its level of cooperation could be much higher than that between allies," Tomikhin told the Global Times on Friday.

Economic cooperation is high on the agenda of the two leaders' meeting.

Reuters reported that Putin said he wants to "catch the Chinese wind in our economic sail."

According to AFP, the Russian gas behemoth Gazprom will provide China with 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year from 2018, with the possibility of taking it up to 60 billion.

Gazprom signed a memorandum of understanding with the State-owned China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) that should lead to the finalization by the end of 2013 of a 30-year delivery contract.

In a separate statement, Russian oil giant Rosneft said it had signed an agreement with CNPC covering cooperation in oil-rich Russian Arctic regions.

Earlier in the day, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yang oversaw the signing of a number of deals, AFP reported.

These agreements included a $2 billion deal involving Russian energy firm En+ Group and China's largest coal company Shenhua Group to develop coal resources in Russia's Far East.

Tomikhin said that he expects the two sides to continue their successful cooperation on the political track, but said China and Russia should improve the quality and level of their economic cooperation.

According to Reuters, Putin said this week that bilateral trade had more than doubled in five years and reached a record high of $88 billion in 2012.

But Sino-Russian trade volume is still about five times smaller than Russian-EU trade volume, while also dwarfed by China's trade with the US.

According to Tomikhin, Chinese investment in Russia is still limited compared to that from the Europe, and most Chinese investment comes from State-owned enterprises.

He attributed the phenomenon to Chinese enterprises' lack of knowledge about Russian laws on investment protection.

China and Russia aim to boost their bilateral trade volume to $100 billion by 2015, with this figure climbing to $200 billion by 2020.

Xi and Putin later in the day also inaugurated the "Tourism Year of China" in Russia to promote people-to-people exchanges between the two neighbors.

The event is part of the "China-Russia Tourism Year."

During his visit, Xi will also meet Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and other Russian leaders.

According to Chinese foreign ministry officials, Xi is scheduled to give a speech at a Moscow university and attend the launch ceremony of a memorial to the Sixth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, which was held in Moscow in 1928. He will also visit the Russian Ministry of Defense and meet Russian Sinologists, students learning Chinese and representatives from the press.

According to China Central Television, it will be the first time that the Russian Ministry of Defense has invited a Chinese leader to visit.

After his Russia trip, Xi will pay visits to Tanzania, South Africa and the Republic of the Congo.

Agencies contributed to this story