Spotlight: Experts optimistic about future U.S.-China cooperation

Experts on U.S.-China relations have highly commented on Chinese President Xi Jinping's speech in Seattle, saying Xi's ongoing state visit to the United States ushers in a great opportunity for the two sides to expand areas of cooperation.

Kevin Rudd, President of Asia Society Policy Institute, said in an event hosted by the institute in New York that the upcoming summit between President Xi and his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama is very important, for it "occurs at a critical time when China rises both as a global economic power and increasingly as a political power".

"I think the two leaders have the capacity to enhance the U.S.-China relationship in a visionary way, which has practical steps associated with it," said Rudd, who is also the former Australian Prime Minister and a fluent Mandarin speaker.

Experts attending the event also applauded Xi's speech delivered in Seattle on the first day of his arrival.

"(The speech) attracted me in tonality and in content as a remarkably embracing and conciliatory address," Rudd said.

He further articulated that "the tonality of the president's speech, is a lecture that reflects a conciliatory embrace of the American people and its tradition... The first half of the speech essentially goes through Americans' list of concerns with the Chinese economy, one after each other, and seeks to give response to each of these concerns."

"That represents putting out a hand of embrace towards the American people on Day One of the visit," he added.

Daniel H. Rosen, a China-focused economic analyst and founding partner at the Rhodium Group, said that Xi masterfully answered the top-level question.

"He said our reform and opening will be continuous. It is on track, there is no turning-back from it," Rosen said, quoting remarks that impressed him most during the speech.

When talking about the prospects of U.S.-China relations, experts generally believed the previous exchanges and dialogues between the two sides have laid solid foundations for the future cooperations.

"There are some unique structural strengths of the U.S.-China relationship," said Evan Medeiros, a former senior director for Asian Affairs at the White House's National Security Council who helped organize several China-U.S. presidential summits.

Firstly, there is a policy foundation and a political commitment at the top, Medeiros noted, pointing out that the Obama administration has been dealing with China for seven years and that the two sides understand each other very clearly.

Secondly, the channels of communication between the United States and China today are broader and deeper than they ever have been before, said Medeiros.

"President Obama has met the Chinese president more times than any other U.S. president in the history of U.S.-China relationship since 1979. This shows the commitment of the Obama administration and the important attention that has been paid to managing the U.S.-China relationship," he said.

"There are other important channels including the Strategic and Economic Dialogue, which is very critical in 2009 and 2010 in managing through the global financial crisis," He added.

Finally, the two sides have built a strong track record of negotiations and cooperations for the past few years, said Medeiros, saying that the United States and China have cooperated on "Iran's nuclear program, North Korea's (the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's) nuclear program, the G20, or more recently the climate change issue".

"We worked through hard issues that build up a level of confidence that there is resilience in U.S.-China relationship. The track record was contributed to the high degree of constancy, clarity and predictability that have led us to the point today," he said.

Medeiros suggested the most important thing to do is to ensure policy makers continue to focus on building a resilient U.S.-China relationship. Endi