BEIJING (AFP) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping said Monday that China-U.S. ties would impact the “destiny of mankind”, as he met with a group of American senators in Beijing.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is the latest high-level American official to go to China as Washington says it seeks to ease tensions with Beijing, leading a six-person delegation.
“How China and the United States get along with each other in the face of a world of change and turmoil will determine the future and destiny of mankind,” Xi said as he met with Schumer at Beijing’s Great Hall of People.
“I have said many times, including to several presidents, that we have 1,000 reasons to improve China-U.S. relations, but not one reason to ruin them,” Xi said, adding China-U.S. ties are “the most important bilateral relationship in the world”.
Earlier China’s top diplomat Wang Yi said he hoped Washington and Beijing could manage their differences “more rationally”.
Meeting with Schumer at Beijing’s Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, Foreign Minister Wang told the senate delegation he hoped their visit would help the two sides “manage existing differences more rationally, helping the relationship between the two countries return to the track of healthy development”.
Wang also said he hoped they would “more accurately understand China” after the trip, which he said comes as the world is in a “turbulent period of change”.
“The crisis in Ukraine has not yet subsided, and warfare has reemerged in the Middle East,” he said.
“All these various challenges need to be addressed by the international community, and China and the United States should play their due roles,” Wang said.
Schumer also Monday met with Zhao Leji, the head of the standing committee of China’s rubber-stamp National People’s Congress.
“Our countries together will shape this century,” Schumer told Zhao.
“As the two great powers it is natural we find ourselves in competition in areas like trade, technology, diplomacy, and more,” he said.
“We welcome this competition,” Schumer stressed. “We do not seek conflict.”
Schumer is the latest high-level U.S. official to visit China as Washington seeks to ease tensions with Beijing, which have flared in recent years over everything from trade to human rights.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Treasury and Commerce Secretaries Janet Yellen and Gina Raimondo, as well as climate envoy John Kerry, have all visited China this year.