Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi on Thursday urged the European Union (EU) to hold consultations with China on their trade disputes.

"While addressing the problems in trade cooperation, China and the EU should seek solutions in the spirit of friendly consultations to achieve win-win outcome," said Wu in a meeting with EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson.

"The further development of Sino-EU relations and bilateral trade cooperation is in the common interests of both sides," said Wu, adding that the EU is China's biggest trading partner while China is now the second biggest trading partner of EU.

Mandelson arrived in Guangzhou in South China's Guangdong Province Monday on his fifth trip to China as the EU Trade Commissioner.

In talks with Mandelson on Wednesday, Chinese Commerce Minister Bo Xilai said that China is making greater efforts to protect intellectual property rights (IPR) and has taken measures to punish IPR violations more severely.

Bo also told his guest that China is unhappy with EU's first ruling against Chinese shoemakers in the anti-dumping case. He urged EU to treat Chinese shoe companies "fairly and reasonably" in the final ruling.

Mandelson responded that EU would take China's requirement seriously and actively consider making efforts to help qualified Chinese companies gain market economy treatment in the final ruling.

Source: Xinhua