JUNE 17, 2020 / 2:56 PM /
UPDATED 5 HOURS AGO
Top U.S, China diplomats meet
in Hawaii amid frayed ties
WASHINGTON/BEIJING
(Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met China’s top diplomat, Yang
Jiechi, in Hawaii on Wednesday amid a deep deterioration of ties between the
strategic rivals, their first face-to-face meeting since last year.
The world’s two largest
economies have been at loggerheads over the handling of the coronavirus
pandemic and China’s move to impose security legislation on Hong Kong, among
the latest flare-ups in tensions that have sharply escalated this year.
Yang told
Pompeo that Washington needs to respect Beijing’s positions on key issues, halt
its interference on matters such as Hong Kong, Taiwan and Xinjiang, and work to
repair relations, China’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Thursday.
Yang said
cooperation between the two countries “is the only correct choice”, according
to the ministry.
Pompeo
stressed “the need for fully-reciprocal dealings between the two nations across
commercial, security, and diplomatic interactions,” U.S. State Department
spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said in a statement.
“He also
stressed the need for full transparency and information sharing to combat the
ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and prevent future outbreaks.”
Beijing
described the meeting as “constructive” and said the two sides had agreed to
continue engagement.
The meeting in Honolulu started
shortly after 9 a.m. (1900 GMT) and concluded at 3:50 p.m. (0150 GMT Thursday),
a senior State Department official said.
As the meeting got under way,
U.S. President Donald Trump signed legislation calling for sanctions against
those responsible for repression of Uighur Muslims in China’s Xinjiang region,
which prompted a threat of retaliation from Beijing.
Separately, foreign ministers
of the G7 countries, including Pompeo, issued a statement calling on China not
to follow through with the Hong Kong legislation which critics call an assault
on the territory’s democratic freedoms.
Pompeo has been forceful in his
criticism of Beijing and it was his first known contact with Yang since they
discussed the coronavirus by phone on April 15.
Tensions have risen also over
China’s neighbor North Korea. The United States and China share concerns about
that country’s nuclear weapons program.
LOW POINT
Experts say U.S.-China
relations have reached their lowest point in years, and in mid-May Trump, who
has pursued a deal to end a damaging trade war he launched with China, went so
far as to suggest he could cut ties with Beijing.
The bill Trump signed earlier
on Wednesday calls for sanctions on Chinese officials responsible for
oppressing Uighur Muslims.
Trump tempered that possibility
by saying he regarded the bill’s sanctions requirements as advisory, not
mandatory.
While Trump and his
administration have stepped up rhetoric against China in the run-up to the
November U.S. election, his former national security adviser, John Bolton, said
on Wednesday the president sought Chinese President Xi Jinping’s help to win
re-election during a closed-door June 2019 meeting.
Bolton’s accusations are part
of a book that the U.S. government on Tuesday sued to block him from
publishing, arguing it contained classified information and would compromise
national security.
Trump hit back at Bolton,
calling him “a liar” in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. He told Fox
News in a separate interview that Bolton had broken the law by including highly
classified material in the book.
Neither side outlined an agenda
for the Hawaii talks, but diplomats and other sources have said the meeting was
requested by China.
U.S. Trade Representative
Robert Lighthizer also told a congressional hearing that Chinese officials had
repeatedly affirmed their commitment to buy more U.S. goods and services under
a Phase 1 trade deal signed in January and that some $10 billion in purchases
had been recorded thus far.
Lighthizer also said, when
asked about exports of products made by Uighurs and other Muslim groups in
camps in China, that Washington would “strongly enforce” U.S. laws banning the
import of goods made by forced labor.
Among his criticisms of China,
Pompeo has said it could have prevented hundreds of thousands of deaths from
the global coronavirus pandemic by being more transparent, and accused it of
refusing to share information.
Trump has initiated a process
of eliminating special U.S. treatment for Hong Kong to punish China for curbing
freedoms there, but has stopped short of immediately ending privileges that
have helped the territory remain a global financial center.
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