China willing to cooperate with US, manage differences: President Xi Jinping

Whether the US and China could establish the “right” way of getting along would be crucial to the world, Xi said in a letter that was delivered at an annual dinner of the New York-headquartered National Committee on US-China Relations.

Xi’s call for more stable bilateral ties, which he says should be built on the principles of “mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation”, comes before a key visit by Foreign Minister Wang Yi to Washington later this week.

The trip from Thursday to Saturday by the top Chinese diplomat will be the highest-level in-person engagement ahead of an expected meeting between US President Joe Biden and Xi in San Francisco at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in November.

Separately, California Governor Gavin Newsom met Xi on Wednesday to discuss climate change and other issues.

Newsom said he had an opportunity to focus more deeply and substantively on climate change in the meeting with Xi, but also discussed Israel as well as the deadly drug fentanyl.

Newsom began his week-long trip to China on Monday, visiting Hong Kong and Shenzhen before meeting senior officials, including Wang, in Beijing on Wednesday.

Several top US officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, met their Chinese counterparts in Beijing this summer.

Washington’s top priority has been to ensure the intense competition between the world’s two biggest economies and their disagreements over a host of issues, from trade to Taiwan and the South China Sea, do not veer into conflict.

“Chinese observers believe the visit (by Mr Wang) will pave the way for a possible meeting between the heads of the two states but added that Washington needs to make concrete efforts to address Beijing’s concerns and show its sincerity,” China’s state-controlled Global Times wrote in a commentary. 

Reuters