Envoy: China part of world's solutions, not its problems

China will continue to be a "reliable member of the international system", committed to promoting peaceful development, while contributing its wisdom and solutions to global issues, said Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. Qin Gang.

The ambassador also called for "vision and actions" to prevent confrontations between China and the United States.

"China does not want to disrupt or overturn the existing international system," Qin said at a dialogue at the Brookings Institution Board of Trustees in Washington on Thursday. "China is not part of the problems in the world, but part of the solutions."

In his speech, "Two Different Countries, One International System", Qin said that in recent years, the world has increasingly looked to China to see what impact the country's rapid growth has on the international order.

"We only want to work for a more peaceful and developed world and at the same time create a favorable environment for our peaceful development and contribute our wisdom and solutions to global issues," Qin said.

He said throughout the five decades of its United Nations membership, China has been a "reliable member of the international system" and will continue being one. "Despite the various difficulties we have, we always try our best to do our part and do it well," he said.

Qin also commented on unclear terms that are frequently used by the U.S. side. The U.S., for example, says that its China policy is to defend the "rules-based international order" and ensure the "rules of the road" are followed. However, the U.S. has not made itself clear on questions such as what the rules are, who made them and who the "traffic police" are.

"In our view, there is only one international system in the world, namely, the international system with the UN at its core. There is only one international order, which is the one underpinned by international law," Qin said.

There is only one set of rules, namely, the basic norms governing international relations based on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, and international affairs should be addressed through consultation, and genuine multilateralism must be practiced, he added.

As relations between the world's top two economies have been going through "unprecedented difficulties" in recent years, some people believe that China and the U.S. are two different systems incompatible with each other, the envoy said. "On this, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres voiced … a common international concern: China and the U.S. must avoid confrontation and the world cannot afford to be further divided," Qin said. "We must work together to prevent his worry from coming true."