On July 28, 1986, President Mikhail Gorbachev had made a speech in Vladivostok dealing with the Soviet Union's Asia policy and with relations between the Soviet Union and China. He had made the following main points: The Soviet Union was ready to hold serious discussions with China at any time and at any level on additional measures to create a good-neighbourly atmosphere and hoped that the border between the two countries would soon become an area of peace and friendship; the Soviet Union was willing to take the main course of the Heilongjiang (Amur) River as the official boundary line between the two countries; the Soviet and Mongolian leaders were studying the withdrawal of a considerable portion of the Soviet troops from Mongolia; the Soviet Union would withdraw six regiments from Afghanistan before the end of 1989; and the Soviet Union understood and respected China's goal of modernization.