U.S. President Barack Obama met with
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Tuesday, the first top-level meeting between the
two countries since the presidential election and a power transition in China.
They met at the East Asia Summit in
Cambodia, the third leg in Obama's Asian tour, which hopes to foster deeper
political and economic ties in the region.
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Obama was keen to put the focus on trade
issues, and ignored questions on a bitter maritime dispute that overshadowed
discussions on the first day of the summit on Monday.
He told Wen that China and the U.S. should
"work to establish clear rules of the road internationally for trade and
investment which can increase prosperity and global growth."
In return, Wen pledged to cooperate in
financial and economic matters "to tackle the difficulties we have and
resolve the differences and disagreements between us."
Both Obama and Governor Mitt Romney talked
tough on China during the presidential campaign, particularly on trade and
currency disputes, although Obama was more measured in his criticism.
Wen congratulated Obama on his re-election
and sent greetings from China's new leader Xi Jinping.
Read: Xi becomes China's new Communist Party
leader
Xi will officially succeed President Hu
Jintao in March after he was selected as head of the Chinese Communist Party at
last week's party congress.
Obama also met with Japanese Prime Minister
Yoshihiko Noda and held discussions with leaders from ASEAN, a grouping of 10
southeast Asian nations.
During the summit, ASEAN leaders clashed
publicly about how to handle a bitter territorial dispute in the South China
Sea and what role the U.S. should play in resolving it.
China claims sovereignty over most of the
waters, which are thought to contain oil and gas deposits, but Vietnam, the
Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have made rival territorial claims.
Read: Does Norway hold key to solving South
China Sea dispute?
Cambodia's statement on Sunday that ASEAN's
10 leaders had agreed not to "internationalize" the South China Sea
dispute by limiting the body to direct negotiations with China provoked an an
angry rebuke by the Philippines, which said there was no consensus.
Philippines President Benigno Aquino said
he wanted the U.S. to get involved in discussions, according to the Philippines
Daily Inquirer.
"Our region is very diverse and its
harmony can easily be disrupted by sheer political, military, or economic
might. Imbalance, as we know, may lead to instability," he said.
"While we are all aware that the U.S.
does not take sides in disputes, they do have a strategic stake in the freedom
of navigation, unimpeded commerce, and the maintenance of peace and stability
in the South China Sea."
Alan Dupont, a professor at the University
of New South Wales in Australia, said that the while U.S. was happy to push
China to the table, it was unlikely to step directly into trying to resolve the
issue.
"The U.S. is not a claimant in the
South China Sea dispute but it does have an interest in maintaining freedom of
navigation," he said.
Read: Why ASEAN will stay weak
Obama and ASEAN leaders agreed to support
the drafting of a regional code of conduct to manage disputes in the sea.
China repeated its long-held position that
the disputes should resolved through "consultations and negotiations by
sovereign states directly concerned."
Dupont said that China had conceded some
ground by agreeing to discuss the dispute with ASEAN.
"But it made it clear it will do so in
discussions with the ASEAN countries and not involve other parties,
specifically read in brackets the United States," he said.
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