Chinese President Hu Jintao shakes hands with U.S. President Barack Obama during a bilateral meeting at the White House in Washington, the United States, Jan. 19, 2011. (Xinhua/Lan Hongguang)Chinese President Hu Jintao has just ended his four-day landmark visit to the United States.During the visit, both sides agreed to build a China-U.S. cooperative partnership based on mutual respect and mutual benefit, which is to lead the development of bilateral ties in the future.It is widely believed that, in the new era, China and the United States need to enhance their political and economic relations, as well as boost cooperation in regional and international affairs.In order to achieve that, observers from across the world hold that the key lies in common actions.Reiterating their commitment to developing a positive, cooperative and comprehensive China-U.S. relationship as they agreed in 2009, Chinese and U.S. leaders also vowed to build "a cooperative partnership based on mutual respect and mutual benefit", during Hu's visit to Washington.The two terms showed a kind of progress which represented the increasing common interests and mutual need of the two sides over the recent period, as well as more and more challenges that required the joint efforts of the largest developed and developing countries, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai said.Yuan Peng, director of the America Studies of China Institute for Contemporary International Relations (CICIR), said the new expression of bilateral ties was positive, objective and pragmatic.As the deepening and development of the previous expression, the new term was a highlight of President Hu's U.S. visit, Yuan said.The joint statement issued by both sides during Hu's stay, which is built upon bilateral efforts to establish the cooperative partnership based on mutual respect and mutual benefit, is a clear reflection of the two countries' resolution and pragmatic attitude in jointly meeting global challenges, according to Chen Kang, professor at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore.In a nutshell, every word matters in the new expression.As "mutual respect" urges both China and the United States to respect each other's core interests and path of development, "mutual benefit" means that both countries are expected to achieve a win-win situation rather than a win-lose one, and bring about common prosperity."Partnership," meanwhile, shows that the two powers, instead of being rivals, are closely linked with each other in actions to cope with regional and international issues.Fu Mengzi, a researcher with the Beijing-based CICIR, told Xinhua, while every country attached great importance to their own national interest, their respective interests were neither unilateral nor absolute."When seeking its own interest, a country should meanwhile take into consideration the interest and major concerns of other countries," Fu said, adding that only by so doing could a win-win result rather than a zero-sum relationship be achieved.