Spy plane crisis over: Beijing
Friday, May 11, 2001
ASSOCIATED PRESS in Honolulu
Updated at 12.35pm:
A top mainland official said on Friday (HK time) that he believes his country and the United States have resolved their dispute over the downed US spy plane, agreeing to hold the highest level meeting with the Bush administration since the crisis began.
China's finance minister, Xiang Huaicheng, and US Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill were meeting on the sidelines of an annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank in Honolulu, primarily to discuss economic issues.
Mr Xiang told reporters ''there has been satisfactory resolution to the troubles'' between Beijing and Washington and that it would be exaggerated to say their relations had been strained over the spy plane any worse than they have been in the past.
Mr Xiang gave no indication any new agreements had been reached on the issue but that the conflict would not remain an obstacle to US-Chinese relations.
''Secretary O'Neill [and I] share a consensus that we need to talk'' to resolve any outstanding issues, Mr Xiang said. ''I trust Secretary O'Neill will ask me whatever questions he has and tell me whatever he wishes to tell.''
Michele Davis, O'Neill's spokeswoman, said the meeting would allow the two officials to get to know one another and discuss their respective economies. ''There is no intention of raising the spy plane or other such issues,'' she said.
A senior US Treasury official said that Mr O'Neill had no plan to raise the issue, but if the Chinese do ''you play the unexpected from your instincts.''
It would be the highest-level meeting Chinese and US officials since Vice-Premier Qian Qichen visited the White House in March.
Relations between the two countries soured last month after an April 1 collision between a US Navy EP-3E surveillance plane and a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea. The Chinese fighter crashed, killing the pilot, and the US plane made an emergency landing on Hainan Island.
The mainland released the 24 US crewmen after 11 days in captivity and has since allowed US officials to inspect the spy plane. They determined it could be repaired and flown off the island, but China has refused to allow this, saying that would outrage the Chinese public.
US forces also have resumed surveillance flights off China's coast, angering Beijing.
The collision set a sour tone to relations early in the Bush administration, further straining ties already hurt by differences over human rights and arms sales to Taiwan.
With anti-riot barricades removed from around the ADB meeting site after smaller than expected protests, the international lending agency got down to business on Friday (HK time), focusing on the bank's main poverty-reduction goals.
In his speech to the ADB governors, Mr Xiang said that wealthy member countries such as the United States and Japan should give more money to the international lending agency as it tries to achieve its primary goal of reducing widespread poverty in Asia.
''While giving ADB the mandate to reduce poverty, its shareholders should have more responsibility to enable the ADB to do its job properly,'' Mr Xiang said.
china.scmp.com
Guess money talks, but it seems to me that others should be meeting on this issue. |
