General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee Hu Jintao shook hands with visiting Chinese Kuomintang (KMT) Party Chairman Lien Chan in Beijing Friday afternoon in the first meeting between top leaders of the two parties in 60 years.

Describing this occasion as a "historic meeting", Hu said that the meeting is a big event in the history of relations between the two parties and two sides of the Taiwan Straits.

Hu said people from both sides across the Taiwan Straits should show the world capability and wisdom in addressing disputes and other problems.

"Both of us should jointly strive for peace and stability in order to create the great revitalization of the Chinese nation," Hu said.

Lien Chan said the two parties "proceed today to achieve happiness and benefits for people on both sides of the Taiwan Straits with goodwill and on the basis of mutual trust".

He called for efforts to avoid confrontation and conflicts, and "seek reconciliation and dialog."

Hu said the "historic meeting" 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.

Late CPC Chairman Mao Zedong and late KMT Chairman Chiang Kai-shek conducted the previous meeting in August 1945 in Chongqing, the wartime capital of China, in an unsuccessful bid to negotiate a truce.

The KMT, China's ruling party from late 1920s to 1940s, left the mainland for the island province of Taiwan in 1949 when it lost a civil war. Now a major opposition party in Taiwan after ruling Taiwan for around 50 years, it still favors an eventual unification with the mainland.

Lien Chan and his KMT delegation arrived in Nanjing Tuesday to begin an eight-day mainland visit at the invitation of the CPC Central Committee and Hu Jintao. After Nanjing and Beijing, the KMT delegation is scheduled to go to Xi'an and Shanghai.

At the close of the Nanjing visit, KMT spokesman Chang Jung-kung Wednesday described the coming visit to Beijing as a trip of reconciliation.