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Cohen Opens China Visit under Missile Defence Cloud
US Defence Secretary William Cohen met Chinese leaders Wednesday in Beijing, his first in more than two years, under strong Chinese opposition to US plans to build anti-missile defences.
Cohen's arrival in Beijing on Tuesday put back on track a military dialogue between the two huge countries, which was frozen by the 1999 NATO bombing of Chinese embassy in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
The two sides have much to talk about, analysts said.
China is opposing US missile defence plans, the so-called Theatre Missile Defence System (TMD) which could cover Taiwan, an integral part of China.
Cohen was likely to be told bluntly of Chinese anger over missile defence plans China considers a violation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty.
However, the United States has alleged China has lately supplied Pakistan with key missile technology.
Both Pakistan and China say that is not true.
Referring to their differences, Cohen said: "While there is a tendency to focus on issues that are in contention...there are many, many issues in which we have mutual interest in working on a cooperative basis."
Cohen met his Chinese counterpart, General Chi Haotian, who told him he hoped the talks would "further deepen our mutual understanding and inject fresh vitality to the long-term growth of China-US relations."
The United States is studying plans to build a National Missile Defence (NMD) system to protect ``vulnerable'' parts of the United States from missile attacks and a Theatre Missile Defence system (TMD) to shelter US and allied troops in Asia.
The China Daily said Wednesday the American plans "can only encourage potential enemies to design a better one, sparking a new race for military supremacy and causing world instability".
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Sun Yuxi also said on Tuesday: "No matter what the United States says, it will not change China's opposition to the anti-missile defence programme."
Russia and China are adamantly opposed to the system.
An unidentified US official said China would likely see US arms sales to Taiwan, arms control and the missile shield system as closely linked.
"The Chinese would like to tie US' arms sales to Taiwan into non-proliferation discussions, NMD, TMD -- all these things from the Chinese point of view tie into the discussion of proliferation and it's a contentious issue," said the official.
China was angered last weekend, when a senior US arms negotiator said the United States had not ruled out sheltering Taiwan region under it.
"We don't rule out the possibility that some time in the future Taiwan may have TMD capabilities," US arms control adviser John Holum said after two days of disarmament and non-proliferation talks in Beijing.
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