China, U.S. launch strategic dialogue in Beijing
Sun Jul 31, 2005
BEIJING, Aug 1 (Reuters) - The United States and China launched bi-annual strategic talks on Monday to try to keep their increasingly complex relationship on an even keel as friction rises over a range of issues.
While Beijing and Washington cooperate in many areas, including the six-party talks to try to defuse the North Korean nuclear crisis now going on in the Chinese capital, ties have been strained in recent months over China's military buildup and a surge in its textile exports.
U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick met Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Sunday for more than 90 minutes of talks ahead of the two-day strategic dialogue, state media said.
U.S. President George W. Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao agreed to open a strategic dialogue with meetings twice a year at an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Chile last year, the China Daily newspaper said.
Zoellick met Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Dai Bingguo on Monday morning at the Diaoyutai State Guest House, which is also hosting the fourth round of nuclear talks between the United States, North Korea, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia.
Speaking to reporters in Hong Kong on Saturday, Zoellick said he would try to focus during the dialogue on the bigger picture of the relationship.
"We'll try to step back from the individual items on the agenda and see how we can integrate the topics," according to a transcript of his comments on a State Department information Web site, usinfo.state.gov.
While in Beijing, Zoellick will also meet members of China's National Development and Reform Commission, a super-ministry in charge of coordinating economic policy and guiding investment and energy policy.
The discussions would hopefully enable the two countries "to get a better sense of one another's interests: where there are points of mutuality -- and I believe there are many; how to work cooperatively; but also, where we have differences, how best to try to manage them", he said.
Earlier this month, China helped ease friction in the U.S. relationship by decoupling its currency from the dollar.
The Bush administration had been pressing Beijing to revalue the yuan, formerly pegged at about 8.28 to the dollar, arguing that it was giving Chinese exporters an unfair trade advantage.
China now sets the yuan's value in reference to a basket of currencies, and it is now worth about 8.1 to the dollar.
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