Summit to focus on 'big picture'of China-US ties(2)

Echoing these comments, Bonnie Glaser, a senior adviser for Asia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank, said the summit is "very significant" as the two leaders will hold lengthy, in-depth discussions on the US-China relationship as well as regional and global issues.

Douglas Paal, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington-headquartered foreign policy think tank, said the two leaders will talk about "the big picture" of bilateral ties.

"It's about how can the US and China avoid conflict, how can we find ways to pursue our own interests in ways that are compatible with the other country's interest, or at least not in conflict with the other country's interest," he told Xinhua.

Paal co-authored an article last fall that proposed holding an informal U.S.-Chinese summit in 2013 to discuss the difficulty in bilateral relations, "which is that our strategic competition is getting ahead of our strategic cooperation."

The imminent Xi-Obama summit, he told Xinhua, is an opportunity for the two sides to get off "on a good, constructive footing" -- not just inheriting the record of conflict and cooperation of the past, but rising above it.