U.S.-China Partnership Faces Formidable Agenda, Says Clinton

11 March 2009 By David McKeeby Staff Writer

Washington — The United States and China face a formidable agenda, says Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, pledging to work with China to address common challenges and seize common opportunities.

“This is a very important relationship to both of our countries, and the United States intends to work together with China to build a positive, cooperative and comprehensive relationship,” Clinton said March 11 in a joint press appearance with Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi.

The minister’s visit to Washington follows Secretary Clinton’s recent consultations in Beijing, and both meetings were dominated by considerations about what two of the world’s largest economies could do to confront the global financial crisis. Talks between the two top diplomats will lay the groundwork for President Obama’s first official meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao on the sidelines of the G20 meeting of developed and emerging economies in London in April.

“The United States and China have a joint responsibility to help ensure that the summit yields tangible progress and concrete action steps toward a coordinated global response to stabilize the world's economy and to begin a recovery,” Clinton said.

As in the United States, China has taken steps to stimulate consumer demand and make strategic investments aimed at restarting economic growth, which Clinton praised as “a very positive step.”

Yang was scheduled to continue the conversation on the global economy with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner later in the day, followed by White House meetings with President Obama and his top advisers March 12.

On the foreign policy front, Clinton and Yang discussed efforts to restart the Six-Party Talks to eliminate nuclear weapons from the Korean Peninsula, Washington and Beijing’s parallel partnership with fellow members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany to convince Iran to suspend uranium enrichment, and the Obama administration’s progress toward a new international strategy to stabilize Afghanistan and the Pakistan border region.

Clinton and Yang also discussed the mounting humanitarian crisis in Sudan’s Darfur region, which threatens to worsen in the aftermath of the International Criminal Court’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. (See “Sudan’s Bashir Should Be Held Accountable, Says Clinton.”)

While the United States and China are celebrating the 30th anniversary of formal diplomatic relations this year, Yang’s visit also comes as the world observes the 50th anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising. The State Department’s annual report on human rights recently concluded that Chinese authorities have acted against global human rights standards by significantly increasing cultural and religious repression in Tibetan areas.

“We urge China to reconsider its policies in Tibet that have created tensions due to their harmful impact on Tibetan religion, culture and livelihoods,” said State Department acting spokesman Robert Wood in a March 10 statement. “We believe that substantive dialogue with the Dalai Lama’s representatives, consistent with the Dalai Lama’s commitment to disclaiming any intention to seek sovereignty or independence for Tibet, can lead to progress in bringing about solutions and can help achieve true and lasting stability in Tibet.”

Open and honest dialogue on human rights differences will remain a key component of U.S.-China relations, Clinton said.

“It has been a core belief of ours that every nation must not only live by but help shape global rules that will determine whether people enjoy the right to live freely and participate to the fullest in their society. Indeed, our own country must continually strive to live up to our own ideals,” Clinton said. “We make clear to all nations, including China, that a mutual and collective commitment to human rights is important to bettering our world, as are efforts on security, global economics, energy, climate change and other pressing issues.”

Clinton and Yang also discussed a March 9 confrontation between five Chinese ships and the USNS Impeccable, an unarmed, civilian-operated naval surveying vessel operating in international waters in the South China Sea. U.S. National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair told a congressional panel March 10 that it was the most serious security incident since 2001, when China forced the landing of a U.S. military plane flying over international waters 110 kilometers from Hainan and held its crew for 10 days.

“We both agreed that we should work to ensure that such incidents do not happen again in the future,” Clinton said.

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