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U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Chinese Premier Li Qiang have a light moment during a meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China Tuesday, August 29, 2023. Picture: ANDY WONG/POOL via REUTERS
Beijing — The US wants to work with China to solve problems such as climate change and artificial intelligence, US commerce secretary Gina Raimondo told China’s Premier Li Qiang at a meeting in Beijing on Tuesday.
Raimundo is the latest Biden administration official to visit China in a bid to strengthen communications, particularly on economy and defence, amid concerns that friction between the two superpowers could spiral out of control.
“There are other areas of global concern, such as climate change, artificial intelligence, the fentanyl crisis, where we want to work with you as two global powers to do what’s right for all of humanity,” Raimondo said at the Great Hall of the People.
Li said sound economic relations and trade co-operation would be beneficial not only to their countries but also to the whole world.
The US and China used to be each other’s largest trading partners but Washington now trades more with neighbours Canada and Mexico, while Beijing deals more with Southeast Asia.
Earlier on Tuesday, Raimondo told China’s economy tsar He Lifeng that the US does not seek to disengage from its rival. “While we will never compromise in protecting our national security, I want to be clear that we will never seek to decouple or hold China’s economy back,” she said.
Before her meeting with He, Raimondo and tourism minister Hu Hepin agreed to hold the 14th China-US tourism leadership summit in China in the first half of 2024, a sign that improving people-to-people ties is important to putting a floor under the bilateral relationship. The step aimed to revive and develop tourism co-operation between the two nations, the commerce department said. The last such summit was held in 2019 in Seattle.
Raimondo has made boosting travel and tourism a big part of her trip. China and the US agreed this month to double the number of flights permitted between them, which are still only a fraction of the number before the pandemic. If China returned to 2019 US tourism levels, that would add $30bn to the US economy and 50,000 US jobs, she said.
Raimondo plans a visit on Wednesday to Shanghai Disneyland, a joint venture of Walt Disney and Chinese state-owned Shendi Group.
US firms have reported growing challenges with operating in China, which has sharply criticised US efforts to block its access to advanced semiconductors.
The first meeting of an initiative to exchange information on export control enforcement was held on Tuesday at the commerce ministry in Beijing, led by Matthew Axelrod, US assistant secretary for export enforcement.
Such an exchange offered a platform to reduce misunderstandings of US national security policies, Raimondo said, but she added that Washington would not compromise or negotiate on such matters.
Raimondo said she had raised concerns about curbs on chipmakers Intel and Micron in more than four hours of talks on economic and trade issues with commerce minister Wang Wentao on a range of US business issues.
China said the talks were a “rational, candid and constructive communication”.
Support our award-winning journalism. The Premium package (digital only) is R30 for the first month and thereafter you pay R129 p/m now ad-free for all subscribers.
US and China make headway easing relations
Beijing — The US wants to work with China to solve problems such as climate change and artificial intelligence, US commerce secretary Gina Raimondo told China’s Premier Li Qiang at a meeting in Beijing on Tuesday.
Raimundo is the latest Biden administration official to visit China in a bid to strengthen communications, particularly on economy and defence, amid concerns that friction between the two superpowers could spiral out of control.
“There are other areas of global concern, such as climate change, artificial intelligence, the fentanyl crisis, where we want to work with you as two global powers to do what’s right for all of humanity,” Raimondo said at the Great Hall of the People.
Li said sound economic relations and trade co-operation would be beneficial not only to their countries but also to the whole world.
The US and China used to be each other’s largest trading partners but Washington now trades more with neighbours Canada and Mexico, while Beijing deals more with Southeast Asia.
Earlier on Tuesday, Raimondo told China’s economy tsar He Lifeng that the US does not seek to disengage from its rival. “While we will never compromise in protecting our national security, I want to be clear that we will never seek to decouple or hold China’s economy back,” she said.
Before her meeting with He, Raimondo and tourism minister Hu Hepin agreed to hold the 14th China-US tourism leadership summit in China in the first half of 2024, a sign that improving people-to-people ties is important to putting a floor under the bilateral relationship. The step aimed to revive and develop tourism co-operation between the two nations, the commerce department said. The last such summit was held in 2019 in Seattle.
Raimondo has made boosting travel and tourism a big part of her trip. China and the US agreed this month to double the number of flights permitted between them, which are still only a fraction of the number before the pandemic. If China returned to 2019 US tourism levels, that would add $30bn to the US economy and 50,000 US jobs, she said.
Raimondo plans a visit on Wednesday to Shanghai Disneyland, a joint venture of Walt Disney and Chinese state-owned Shendi Group.
US firms have reported growing challenges with operating in China, which has sharply criticised US efforts to block its access to advanced semiconductors.
The first meeting of an initiative to exchange information on export control enforcement was held on Tuesday at the commerce ministry in Beijing, led by Matthew Axelrod, US assistant secretary for export enforcement.
Such an exchange offered a platform to reduce misunderstandings of US national security policies, Raimondo said, but she added that Washington would not compromise or negotiate on such matters.
Raimondo said she had raised concerns about curbs on chipmakers Intel and Micron in more than four hours of talks on economic and trade issues with commerce minister Wang Wentao on a range of US business issues.
China said the talks were a “rational, candid and constructive communication”.
Reuters
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