27 April 2010Geithner, Clinton to visit Beijing end of May
WASHINGTON : US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner head to Beijing next month for high level talks as tensions build on a range of pressing issues, from China's currency to Iran, officials said.
The Treasury Department said the two top cabinet secretaries would hold a "strategic and economic" dialogue with Chinese leaders May 24-25, confirming dates for one of the biggest Sino-US meetings this year.
The sessions come as Washington and Beijing wrestle over key issues across the range of their relations.
Washington has stepped up pressure on Beijing to support another round of UN sanctions against Iran with Vice President Joe Biden predicting over the weekend that China would come around.
The United States also has moved gingerly to press Beijing to allow the yuan to strengthen against the dollar amid increasingly bitter complaints in the US Congress of Chinese currency manipulation.
The talks also would be a forum for what US officials said would be a "candid" airing differences on human rights, the Internet and religious freedom.
State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said last week that the two sides would likely discuss "the broader topic of Internet freedom and the availability of information to Chinese citizens."
"We disagree with China as to what that represents," he said.
Google said in January that it would stop cooperating with China's censorship of the Internet after reporting cyberattacks against the accounts of the company and activists.
China rigorously filters the Internet to block access to sensitive topics such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown on democracy protesters and the banned Falungong spiritual movement.
It will be Geithner's second trip to China in as many months, as he continues efforts to persuade China to let the yuan strengthen against the dollar.
Beijing's critics say the Chinese currency is undervalued by as much as 40 percent, making its exports artificially competitive.
Geithner has eschewed boisterous demands from Congress for US sanctions against China for currency manipulation, preferring quiet diplomacy.
But as US unemployment festers and Congress heads to midterm elections later this year, he faces pressure for quick results.
Since Geithner announced the delay of a mid-April report that could have branded China a "manipulator" there has been little sign of a policy shift in Beijing.
Geithner's last visit to Beijing in early April netted no specific pledges from China or major breakthroughs.
A G20 ministers meeting in Washington last week did not address the issue explicitly in a final communique, although it called for "sustainable and balanced growth."
But pressure appears to be building on Beijing from within China's ruling class. Brazil and India also have joined the call for China to let the yuan rise.
The International Monetary Fund, which held its annual spring meetings over the weekend, said China must let its currency appreciate for its own financial well-being.
Forecasting two more years of red-hot expansion for the world's number-three economy, the institution said the Chinese yuan was "substantially" undervalued and was skewing world trade.
A yuan adjustment would help China tackle "excess demand pressures," the IMF said in an apparent reference to the threat of rising inflation, and give other emerging economies confidence to let their own currencies strengthen.
Clinton and Geithner are expected to hold talks with State Councilor Dai Bingguo and Vice Premier Wang Qishan, according to the Treasury Department.
- AFP/il
