Xi-Obama one-on-one is all about substance
- By Yi Fan
0 Comment(s)
Print
E-mail China Daily, September 28, 2015
At the bilateral level, these retreats have boosted cooperation and mitigated tension. Examples abound. On all three occasions, the two leaders reiterated their desire to reach a high-standard "Bilateral Investment Treaty". After exchanging and revising their respective negative lists, the two sides are now working to achieve this goal.
Military-to-military ties between the countries are an "underdeveloped" area. At Sunnylands, Xi proposed two confidence-building mechanisms (CBMs) to change the dynamics. After the Yingtai retreat, they announced mutual notification of major military activities and a code of behavior for the safety of maritime and air encounters.
A few days ago, at Rose Garden, the two leaders announced the broadening of the CBMs to cover more activities. Even on cyberspace, widely considered a point of contention in Sino-US ties, Xi and Obama have proven critics wrong by showing a readiness to cooperate in investigations and facilitate international negotiations to establish acceptable norms.
Without Sino-US cooperation, it would have been much more difficult to manage, let alone resolve, many regional and global issues. The Iranian nuclear issue is a case in point.
One of the under-appreciated facts about China-US relations is the growing cooperation to meet global challenges, such as the joint response to the Ebola epidemic in western Africa. A key deliverable at the Sunnylands meeting was the joint pledge to phase down hydrofluorocarbons, or the "super-greenhouse gases". At Yingtai, the two leaders went a step further by announcing significant actions to fight climate change, a move that was widely hailed as a game-changer for international negotiations. After their White House meeting a couple of days ago, they gave a clarion call to the world to secure "an ambitious, successful Paris outcome" at the climate conference in December.
Seventy-years ago, China and the US fought alongside each other to defeat a common enemy. Thirty-six years ago, they came together, driven by an alignment of strategic interests. But then, China was just emerging from a tumultuous decade. Today, China and the US have a high stake in each other's success, just as the world has in a strong and resilient China-US relationship, to which the Xi-Obama summits have undoubtedly contributed. We are all better off because of it.
The author is an analyst with the Foreign Ministry of China.
Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)