Top US official in China for security talks

BEIJING:

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and China's top diplomat Wang Yi said on Tuesday they were hoping for productive talks as they met in Beijing.

Washington allies Japan and the Philippines have blamed China in the past week for raising regional tensions, with Tokyo accusing Beijing of violating its airspace and Manila calling it the "biggest disruptor" of peace in Southeast Asia.

Sullivan said after he arrived in the Chinese capital on Tuesday afternoon that he looked forward to "a very productive round of conversations" with foreign minister Wang.

"We'll delve into a wide range of issues, including issues on which we agree and those issues... where there are still differences that we need to manage effectively and substantively," he said.

Wang told Sullivan he was keen for "substantive" and "constructive" talks during his visit, the first to China by a US national security adviser since 2016.

He also said he wanted the two sides to "help China-US relations move forward towards the San Francisco vision", referring to a framework hashed out by Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping during talks in the US city last year.

China has kept up its sabre-rattling since the inauguration this year of President Lai Ching-te, whose party emphasises Taiwan's separate identity.

"These activities are destabilising, risk escalation, and we're going to continue to urge Beijing to engage in meaningful dialogue with Taipei," the American official said.

Sullivan will also reiterate US concerns about China's support for the expansion of Russia's defence industry since its invasion of Ukraine.

Beijing counters that, unlike the United States, it does not give weapons directly to either side.

China has been eager to work with US national security advisers, seeing them as decision-makers close to the president who can negotiate away from the media spotlight that comes with the secretary of state or other top leadership.

The modern US-China relationship was launched when Henry Kissinger, then national security adviser to Richard Nixon, secretly visited Beijing in 1971 to lay the groundwork for normalising relations with the communist state.