China said on Sunday that "wisdom and patience" are needed to
find solutions to the nuclear issues on Korean Peninsula.
President Hu Jintao and US President George W. Bush held
a 75-minute meeting on the sideline of the Asia-Pacific Economic
Cooperation (APEC) on Sunday, during which Hu expressed the
willingness to work with all parties, including US, to push the
resumption of the Six-Party talks at appropriate time.
"We should insist on peaceful dialogues and find practical
solutions with wisdom and patience to achieve the denuclearization
of the Peninsula?at an early date," said Hu.
He urged all parties to reaffirm the commitments made in the
joint statement signed by six countries in September of last year.
Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), US, Republic of
Korea, China, Russia and Japan are involved in the talks.
In the "September 19 joint statement," DPRK is committed to
abandoning all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programmes,
while US affirmed that it has no nuclear weapons on the Korean
Peninsula and has no intention to attack or invade the DPRK with
nuclear or conventional weapons.
But follow-up discussions in November 2005 failed to make any
progress on implementing the deal and no meetings have been held
since. Pyongyang tested a nuclear device on Oct. 9.
Bush told Hu that international community should give signals to
urge DPRK to take right action and be on the right track.
The US hopes to resolve the problem through peaceful means and
hopes the Six-Party talks could achieve success, Bush was quoted as
saying by Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao.
On the Iranian nuclear issue, Hu urged all parties to "keep
patience and calmness" and hold contact and dialogues with Iran to
find effective solution, so as to create conditions for the
resumption of negotiations.
Bush said that the Security Council of the United Nations should
adopt resolute and rational attitudes towards the Iranian nuclear
issues.
Strategic economic dialogue
China and US will hold their first strategic economic dialogue
in the middle of next month, according to Hu.
US Secretary of Treasury and Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi will
lead the dialogue, which is expected to cover many issues of common
concerns in economic and trade sectors.
"The dialogue mechanism will be very important for pushing
bilateral economic and trade co-operation," said spokesman Liu,
noting both China and US are important trade members in the global
economy.
Hu said that bilateral trade has also been expanding very
rapidly. According to US figures, US exports to China in the first
seven months of this year jumped 35 per cent.
Bilateral trade reached US$211.63 billion last year, up 24.8 per
cent over the previous year. China enjoys the surplus of US$114.17
billion.
Both leaders are satisfied with the development of bilateral
ties.
They have already met three times this year, had four telephone
conversations and maintained great exchange of letters.
"It is fair to say that we had kept very close touch and has
vigorously promoted the China-US relations", said Hu, noting he
witnessed the new progress in bilateral ties since they met in S.
Petersburg of Russia this July.
The two countries have maintained frequent exchange of visits at
the top levels and different levels, according to Hu.
China's naval ships have paid visit to US for the first time in
the six years, and the naval ships of two countries are conducting
joint search and rescue maneuvers today (on Sunday) in Chinese
waters.
"We are happy with the healthy and stable development of
bilateral relations," said Hu.
Bush said that China and US?both realize that working
together can accomplish a lot in security in the world and
prosperity of the people.
"China is a very important nation and the United States believes
strongly that by working together we can help solve problems such
as North Korea and Iran," said Bush.
He admitted there are some problems in bilateral trade, but
promised to adopt the spirit of mutual respect to solve problems in
the interests of people.
"With as much commerce between our countries as there is,
there's going to be trade difficulties," Bush said, "but
nevertheless we both adopt a spirit of mutual respect and the
desire to work through our problems for the common good of our
peoples."
As the "stakeholder" and "constructive cooperator", China and US
increase mutual trust, appropriately deal with differences and push
the advancement of constructive and co-operative ties, according to
Hu.
He urged US to appropriately handle the question of Taiwan by
keeping commitments and not sending any wrong signals to Taiwan
independence forces.
Bush said that US understands the sensitivity of the question of
Taiwan as well as its impact on Sino-US relations. The US
government does not have any change to its policy on Taiwan, he
noted.
Hu also called for increasing cooperation in Asia-Pacific region
to maintain the peace, stability and prosperity in the region.
The two sides should expand exchanges in such sectors as
anti-terrorism, non-proliferation, defence, energy, aerospace,
science and technology, education, culture, public health and youth
so as to enrich contents of bilateral partnership.
The US welcomes the development of China and does not worry
about competition caused by China's development, said Bush.
(
China Daily November 19, 2006)
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