China's US envoy pays uncommon visit to Pentagon for security talks

livemint.com:

China's ambassador to the United States held a rare meeting at the Pentagon on Wednesday with the top US defence official for Asia, the Pentagon said, in talks that followed US criticism of Chinese reluctance to engage in military communications. A brief Pentagon statement said Chinese Ambassador Xie Feng discussed defence relations and "a range of international and regional security issues" in talks with Ely Ratner, a US assistant secretary of defence.

"Ratner also underscored the Department's commitment to maintaining open lines of military-to-military communication between the United States and the PRC," Pentagon spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Martin Meiners said, using the acronym for China's official name. The discussions lasted about 90 minutes, Meiners said.

In a statement early Thursday, China's embassy in Washington said Xie urged the US to meet China halfway to gradually return relations between the two countries and their militaries to the right track. "A healthy and stable China-US relationship is in the common interest of both countries," Xie said in the meeting, according to the statement.

Xie also requested "the U.S. side to take action to remove obstacles, manage differences, handle Taiwan and other important and sensitive issues cautiously in accordance with the principles of the three Sino-US joint communiques." Yun Sun, director of the China program at the Stimson Center, said the meeting was "quite unusual." "The Chinese ambassador does not often meet with US senior defense officials," Sun said.