On Monday, US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo met with her Chinese counterpart in Beijing to emphasize the significance of a stable economic relationship between the two nations amid efforts to cool trade tensions.
US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo met with her Chinese counterpart in Beijing on Monday, saying it was “profoundly important” for the world’s two biggest economies to have a stable relationship.
Her visit is the latest in a series of recent high-level trips to China by US officials as Washington works to cool trade tensions with Beijing.
The trips could culminate in a meeting between their leaders, with US President Joe Biden saying he was expecting to sit down with China’s Xi Jinping this year.
Raimondo met on Monday morning with Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao, describing the economic relationship between the two countries as “the most significant in the world.”
“We share 700 billion dollars of trade, and I concur with you that it is profoundly important that we have a stable economic relationship,” she said, according to a readout from the US Commerce Department.
“It’s a complicated relationship; it’s a challenging relationship,” she told Wang.
“We will of course, disagree on certain issues, but I believe we can make progress if we are direct, open, and practical.”
Raimondo arrived in Beijing on Sunday and was met by Lin Feng, the director of the commerce ministry’s Americas and Oceania department, as well as US Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns.
Relations between the United States and China have plummeted to some of their lowest levels in decades, with US trade curbs near the top of the laundry list of disagreements.
Washington says they are crucial to safeguarding national security, but China sees them as seeking to curb its economic rise.
Miroslava Salazar, with AFP
