China, US in new round of strategic talks

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States and China held a
new round of strategic talks on Wednesday, discussions
Washington said underscored shared responsibilities as
“stakeholders” in the global economic and security system.

State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said the
two-day meeting in Washington would cover bilateral issues as
well as international topics including Iraq and Sudan and the
the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran.

“They will be looking at a number of issues — bilateral,
security-related, economic related — in a strategic context,
with the aim of exploring the responsibility that both
countries share to make the international system more secure
and more prosperous over the long term,” he said.

“They will also look to the long term, over the horizon, to
the future of U.S. and Chinese relations and what we hope that
the relationship will look like,” Ereli added.

The meeting between U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert
Zoellick and Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Dai Bingguo follows
inaugural talks in Beijing in August, a new high-level effort
to manage friction in increasingly complex relations.

Washington and Beijing cooperate in areas including
counter-terrorism and six-party talks to try to end the North
Korean nuclear crisis.

But they have often sparred over human rights, trade and
currency disputes and China’s military buildup. China’s close
ties with Sudan, Iran, Venezuela and other states at odds with
the United States have added to the friction.

Ereli said the talks aimed “not to prescribe courses of
action or specific moves” but to discuss shared
responsibilities as “stakeholders” in the world system.

Zoellick unveiled the phrase “responsible stakeholder” in a
key policy speech in September in which he urged China to
assure the world it would use its growing might responsibly.

Iran, a major energy supplier to China which is locked in
an impasse with United States and Europe over its suspected
nuclear weapons program, would be raised as “an example of the
dangers of proliferation,” Ereli said.

He said Washington would explain to Beijing “how we see
China playing a positive role in that area, and how China might
be willing to consider how the rest of the world sees it.”