Xi, Tillerson acknowledge differences between US, China

During their talks, Tillerson told Xi that President Trump looked forward to visiting his country and enhancing understanding between both Washington and Beijing.

Tillerson’s China visit, it seems, is aimed at finding common grounds for bottleneck issues to prepare conducive atmosphere for Trump-Jinping summit, something that China also realises.

Mr Xi said: ‘You said that China-US relations can only be friendly.

“We should properly handle and manage sensitive issues to promote the healthy and stable development of sino-US relationship from a new start”, Xi told Tillerson here.

He said South Korea that USA military action against North Korea is an “option on the table”, and warned the country to end its missile and nuclear programmes.

Since Donald Trump took office, North Korea has launched five missiles between the seas of Japan and the Korean peninsula, which has prompted the US president to accuse Beijing of not doing enough.

China hasn’t responded directly to those comments, although Beijing has called repeatedly for all sides to take steps in reducing tensions.

State news agency KCNA said the North’s leader supervised the test of the rocket engine. But Beijing has refused to cripple the country’s economy out of fears of a refugee flood across the border and the loss of a buffer zone between South Korea and USA troops stationed there.

Beijing was Tillerson’s final stop on his first official trip to Asia, which also included visits to Japan and South Korea. Because what China sees as core interests are a set of key subjects, from Taiwan to territorial disputes to human rights concerns, on which they have long demanded the United States uniformly butt out. He took to Twitter, saying: “North Korea is behaving very badly”.

After meeting his Chinese counterpart, Foreign Minster Wang Yi, on Saturday, the top USA diplomat stressed “renewed determination” by Beijing and Washington to “work together to convince the North Korean government to choose a better path and a different future for its people”, without giving details. The ignition took place at the Tongchang-ri rocket launch station, near the North’s border with China, according to North Korea media.

China’s Foreign Ministry also released its own statement, urging more cooperation in defusing “regional hot spots”.

-China relations. And at the core of that vision is the idea that the US must treat China as its equal.

Tillerson dodged a reporter’s question about where the US might draw a “red line”, the crossing of which might trigger a military strike.

North Korea is banned by the United Nations from long-range missile tests but claims its satellite programme is for peaceful use.

Xi said he has communicated with Trump several times through telephone conversations and messages.

None of this was mentioned as Mr Tillerson met President Xi in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People. But China has not changed its bottom line of avoiding actions that would destabilize Kim Jong-un’s regime.

The US and China still do not see eye-to-eye on multiple issues, including the One China policy – that denies global recognition to Taiwan as an independent state, political freedom in Hong Kong, and the rights of the country’s Tibetan minority.