By Li Hongmei
On Friday, Chinese President Xi Jinping will meet President Obama, their first meeting as heads of state. China and the United States are the world's two major players, which alone makes this meeting very important. But this meeting has extra significance for a number of reasons, and it could become a momentum that would transform the landscape of China-U.S. relations.
The upcoming Xi-Obama summit is not a typical head-of- state visit that will follow the formalized protocols in the Oval office. Instead, President Xi and President Obama will spend two days at the Annenberg Retreat in Rancho Mirage, California. Far away from the intense pressure and scrutiny of Washington, D.C., the two leaders and their teams will retreat to Californian country seeking opportunity to genuinely connect.
The meeting with more personal touch, involving six or eight hours of daily talks, will be a historic format for China-US diplomacy and will help both leaders to make a genuine impression on each other.
Additionally, President Xi is meeting President Obama within his first 100 days of office, which is seen by observers as a showcase that Chinese diplomacy is becoming more confident.
More important, what gets discussed in California will most likely set the agenda for China-US relations for the next five years.
Both leaders will most likely exchange views on broad geo-political trends and worldviews, as the two powers are required to give a renewed vigor to the bilateral relationship at the juncture.
According to Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang, "President Xi Jinping and President Obama will have an extensive and in-depth exchange of views on bilateral relations as well as international and regional issues of common interest."
Talks will likely revolve around topics such as trade, say, a mooted China-US Free Trade agreement and the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP); the U.S. pivot to Asia; cyber security, specifically the invisible threat of hacker attacks and the diplomatic gridlock such as denuclearization of Korean Peninsula.
This meeting reflects the maturity of the relationship between the two countries, thanks to efforts from both sides to institutionalize bilateral communication, for instance, the annual China-US Strategic & Economic Dialogue. Every year key figures from both governments meet at the G20 or International Governmental Organizations such as the UN, WTO, etc.
In California the two leaders have the chance to reassure each other, pinpoint congruence and divergence, and create a system that reduces the potential for conflicts in the form of trade war or cyber warfare.
"The goal of the encounter is to establish the personal relationship between the two leaders and explore ways to dispel - or at least better manage - the mutual suspicions that have recently been dragging down the relationship," as a CCTV commentary goes.
Huffington Post also touched on the significant side of the Xi-Obama summit, saying the "Chinese Dream" is paraphrased as "to be the number one economy and rejuvenation of China".
The U.S. is key to both facets of the "Chinese Dream." For one thing, the U.S. imported more from China in 2012 (18.7 percent of its total imports that year) than from any other country.
For President Obama, a graceful transition that is not considered by history to be his personal failure and a fadeaway of American global leadership is essential.
"China's ascendance has solidified under his watch; the largest foreign holder of U.S. debt is China, which owns about US$1.2 trillion, amounting to about eight percent of publicly held U.S. debt; and by the time President Obama leaves office, China is likely to overtake the U.S. and become the number one economy in purchasing power terms," says Huffington Post.
