Meeting to set S&ED agenda, pave way for Xi's U.S. visit in Sep
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will meet with senior Chinese leaders in Beijing this weekend at a time of heightened concerns over regional stability following enhanced defense cooperation guidelines between the U.S. and Japan.
The U.S. State Department announced Monday that the top U.S. diplomat will visit Beijing Saturday and Sunday to discuss the annual U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (S&ED), scheduled to be held in Washington in late June, as well as Chinese President Xi Jinping's upcoming visit to the U.S. in September.
Observers believe that current Sino-U.S. relations have been challenged by renewed security and economic concerns, following revised defense guidelines between Japan and the U.S. for the first time in 18 years that will grant Japan a bigger role in Asian regional stability.
Economically, observers also pointed out that the U.S. experienced a "foreign policy failure" following its alleged futile attempts to lobby its allies, including Australia, not to join the China-initiated Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
The U.S. has publicly welcomed the AIIB, but has announced no plans to join as a founding member and voiced concerns over the bank's standards.
"It is rare for a U.S. official of such a high rank to visit China ahead of the S&ED, which shows the U.S. attaches great importance to the upcoming meeting," Wu Xinbo, Director of the Center for American Studies at Fudan University, told the Global Times.
"There are considerable parts of the renewed defense guidelines between Japan and the U.S. that come with implications for China. U.S. officials may justify the guidelines during the meeting, but the Chinese side will restate that it opposes any move that will shake regional stability," Wu said.
Wu said he believes the S&ED agenda will be set during Kerry's visit. Results from the meeting will pave the way for Xi's planned US visit in September.
The S&ED, first announced by U.S. President Barack Obama and then-Chinese President Hu Jintao in 2009, is a high-level dialogue for the two countries to discuss a wide range of regional and global strategic and economic issues.
The first meeting was held in Washington in July 2009.
The seventh round of the S&ED will also take place in Washington this June. The meeting will be headed by Kerry, US Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew, Chinese State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Vice Premier Wang Yang.
Meantime, the sixth annual U.S.-China Consultation on People-to-People Exchanges (CPE) will also be held in late June in Washington and will be chaired by Kerry and Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong.
The CPE is a high-level annual forum for government and private-sector representatives from both countries to discuss ways of strengthening people-to-people ties between the US and China in the fields of education, culture, health, science and technology, sports, and women's issues.
Zha Xiaogang, a research fellow at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, said he believes the S&ED remains an essential platform for regular communications in the face of conflicts and disagreements between the world's two biggest economies, especially on how the U.S. can adjust to China's recent rise as a superpower.
The two experts said other thorny issues including the East and South China Sea territorial disputes, North Korea's nuclear program, climate change, cyber security, and the renminbi's inclusion in the International Monetary Fund's basket of the Special Drawing Rights may also be discussed at the S&ED.
China has repeatedly said that continued U.S. interference in the South China Sea would threaten the trend of regional peace and stability.
Kerry is also scheduled to visit Seoul on May 17 for talks with South Korean President Park Geun-hye.
