"US must respect China's interests",
Xi Jinping warns in Washington speech
Sunday 08 February 2015
America must “respect the interests and the concerns of China”, the country’s future president Xi Jinping warned on Wednesday as strains and differences in the US-China relationship continued to loom over his landmark visit to Washington.
“The world is currently undergoing profound changes, and China and the United States face shared challenges and shared responsibilities in international affairs,” Mr Xi said on the second day of his three-day visit.
“We should further use bilateral and multilateral mechanisms to enhance
coordination between China and the United States on hotspots, including
developments on the Korean peninsula and the Iran nuclear issue,” he said.
“It is a course that cannot be stopped or reversed," he added, describing ever
more intertwined interests. “Chinese-US relations are now at a new
historical starting point in the second decade of the 21st century.”
The carefully choreographed visit, described by White House officials as a
‘relationship-building exercise’ before Mr Xi takes the reins of power in
Beijing this autumn, has not managed to avoid talk of key differences on
trade, human rights and US power in the Pacific.
Introducing Mr Xi at a lunch for key business people, the former Secretary of
State Henry Kissinger, who helped President Richard Nixon open the door to
China in the 1970s, told the Chinese politician: "You are here at a crucial
moment,” suggesting the direction of the next phase of the US-China
relationship hung in the balance.
However, a day after his meeting with Mr Xi in the Oval office, Barack Obama
was underscoring growing US dissatisfaction at Chinese trade practices while
speaking at a campaign-style visit to a factory in the Midwest, a crucial
battleground in the upcoming election.
“I will not stand by when our competitors don't play by the rules," he told workers at Master Lock, a company he lauded in his State of the Union address last month for having moved back about 100 union jobs from China since mid-2010.
“That's why I directed my administration to create a Trade Enforcement Unit with one job: investigating unfair trade practices in countries like China," he said, encouraging US firms to repatriate jobs that they had previously out-sourced to China.
Cases of alleged cyberespionage originating from China against Western industries have been highlighted in the US press in recent days, with the New York Times reporting the case of a Massachusetts wind energy company, American Superconductor Corporation, whose Chinese partner allegedly stole key technology.
The Wall Street Journal this week disclosed that hackers believed to be based in China penetrated a now bankrupt Canadian telecommunications company, Nortel, and had access to its entire system for at least a decade.
At the lunch Mr Xi was flanked by a senior Communist Party officials, as well as chief executives from Coca Cola, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Dow Chemical, DuPont, Procter & Gamble and Estee Lauder.
Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent expressed the cautious optimism felt in the US business community about expanding ties with China. He described Mr Xi's visit as “another important milestone toward building an enduring and constructive relationship between our two nations.”
However earlier on a visit to Capitol Hill, Mr Xi was challenged over China’s deteriorating human rights record and military posturing in the Asia-Pacific.
“Responsible nations must be committed to confronting the Chinese regime on its dark human rights record,” said Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Republican chair of the House Foreign Relations Committee, accusing Mr Obama of "one dangerous concession after another" to China.
After demanding the release of missing human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng, she added: “I also urge the administration not to cave to Chinese demands concerning US strategic alliances and military presence in the region.”
Mr Xi will now move to the state of Iowa, a major exporter of agricultural products to China, for the second leg of his visit, before rounding off in Los Angeles on Thursday.
“I will not stand by when our competitors don't play by the rules," he told workers at Master Lock, a company he lauded in his State of the Union address last month for having moved back about 100 union jobs from China since mid-2010.
“That's why I directed my administration to create a Trade Enforcement Unit with one job: investigating unfair trade practices in countries like China," he said, encouraging US firms to repatriate jobs that they had previously out-sourced to China.
Cases of alleged cyberespionage originating from China against Western industries have been highlighted in the US press in recent days, with the New York Times reporting the case of a Massachusetts wind energy company, American Superconductor Corporation, whose Chinese partner allegedly stole key technology.
The Wall Street Journal this week disclosed that hackers believed to be based in China penetrated a now bankrupt Canadian telecommunications company, Nortel, and had access to its entire system for at least a decade.
At the lunch Mr Xi was flanked by a senior Communist Party officials, as well as chief executives from Coca Cola, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Dow Chemical, DuPont, Procter & Gamble and Estee Lauder.
Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent expressed the cautious optimism felt in the US business community about expanding ties with China. He described Mr Xi's visit as “another important milestone toward building an enduring and constructive relationship between our two nations.”
However earlier on a visit to Capitol Hill, Mr Xi was challenged over China’s deteriorating human rights record and military posturing in the Asia-Pacific.
“Responsible nations must be committed to confronting the Chinese regime on its dark human rights record,” said Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Republican chair of the House Foreign Relations Committee, accusing Mr Obama of "one dangerous concession after another" to China.
After demanding the release of missing human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng, she added: “I also urge the administration not to cave to Chinese demands concerning US strategic alliances and military presence in the region.”
Mr Xi will now move to the state of Iowa, a major exporter of agricultural products to China, for the second leg of his visit, before rounding off in Los Angeles on Thursday.
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