China’s president Hu Jintaowould attend a summit on nuclear security in Washington
China announced on Thursday that Hu Jintao, the country's president, would attend a summit on nuclear security in Washington later this month, a goodwill gesture to the US after weeks of tension over a range of issues.
In recent weeks, the bilateral relationship has been shaken by President Barack Obama's decision to sell $6.4bn of arms to Taiwan and to meet the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan leader, as well as sometimes heated exchanges over trade, pressure to revalue the Chinese currency and Google's move to defy China's censorship regime.
Since Beijing had not committed itself to attending the April 12 summit until now, there had been worries it could skip the meeting in a sign of displeasure.
Qin Gang, foreign ministry spokesman, told reporters on Thursday that Mr Hu would participate in the summit on his way to visit Brazil, Venezuela and Chile. The nuclear summit would mainly discuss nuclear terrorism and potential countermeasures, said Mr Qin.
The announcement follows some conciliatory moves from both Washington and Beijing. Mr Obama stressed the importance of US-China relations when meeting Beijing's new ambassador to Washington this week, and China acknowledged his remarks as an important gesture of goodwill in front-page stories in state newspapers.
China's gesture came amid broader signs of more co-operation in international security affairs. Susan Rice, the US ambassador to the United Nations, said on Wednesday that Beijing had agreed in a conference call to start talks about sanctions against Iran. This marked a change of heart as Beijing had long reiterated its opposition in principle against sanctions.
Mr Qin confirmed the phone conversation and said the parties involved had agreed to continue talking, but did not comment on sanctions.
As Saeed Jalili, Iran's senior nuclear negotiator, arrived in Beijing for talks on Thursday.
Mr Qin said that China would continue to work towards a peaceful resolution of the Iranian nuclear issue.
“We will play a responsible and constructive role in aim to resolve this issue,” he said. “We believe every result should serve the two goals of safeguarding the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, while maintaining the stability and security of the region.”
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