On May 13, 2011, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi met with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov on the sidelines of the meeting of Foreign Ministers' Council of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

During the bilateral meeting, they exchanged views over issues including the visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao to Russia and the SCO Astana Summit to be held in June, 2011. The two ministers pledged to make joint efforts to ensure the success of the above two events so as to further promote their bilateral strategic cooperative partnership.