WASHINGTON – The United States and China held “candid” talks on maritime issues on Friday, including on the contested South China Sea, and the US side underscored its concerns about “dangerous and unlawful” Chinese actions there, the US State Department said.
The talks took place in Beijing between the department’s China coordinator Mark Lambert and China’s boundary and ocean affairs director-general Hong Liang, the State Department said in a statement.
The meeting follows recent high-level diplomacy ahead of an expected meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the mid-November Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco.
The US statement said the talks were part of “efforts to maintain open lines of communication and responsibly manage the US-China relationship” and that the US side reiterated the need to resume military-to-military channels, “to avoid miscommunication and miscalculation”.
It described the talks as “substantive, constructive and candid” and said they covered a range of maritime issues, including the South China Sea and East China Sea, which are contested by China and other nations.
“The United States underscored concerns with the PRC’s dangerous and unlawful actions in the South China Sea,” it said, referring to the People’s Republic of China.
Such actions included China’s obstruction of an Oct 22 Philippine resupply mission at Second Thomas Shoal and its “unsafe” interception of a US aircraft on Oct 24, the statement said.
China’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Saturday that the two sides had a candid, in-depth and constructive exchange on the maritime situation, maritime security and maritime economy.
China expressed serious concerns about rising US regional military deployment, frequent close-in reconnaissance against China, and support for violations and provocations by countries in the South China Sea, the statement said.
The two sides emphasised that they should strengthen dialogue and communication to avoid misunderstanding and misjudgment, it said.
China said on Monday after a visit by Foreign Minister Wang Yi to Washington that the US and China would hold “consultations on arms control and non-proliferation” in the coming days, as well as separate talks on maritime affairs and other issues.
A State Department spokesperson said US Assistant Secretary for Arms Control Mallory Stewart would host Mr Sun Xiaobo, head of the arms-control department in China’s Foreign Ministry, at the State Department next week.
“We have continually called on the PRC to substantively engage on arms control issues and reducing strategic risk,” the spokesperson said, referring to US concerns about China’s nuclear weapons build-up and frustration that Beijing has shown little interest in discussing this.
A flurry of diplomatic engagements in recent months, largely at Washington’s request, has sought to salvage what were rapidly deteriorating ties between the two countries following the US downing in February of a suspected Chinese spy balloon.
While Mr Biden and Mr Xi are expected to meet in November, China has yet to confirm this and a senior Biden administration official said on Tuesday that important details have yet to be hammered out. REUTERS
