Xi-Obama summit highlighted nations' different concerns

The recent summit between President Xi Jinping and US counterpart Barack Obama highlighted the two nations' different strategic concerns, even though the leaders attempted to present a united front.

The summit at a retreat in California ended with China and the United States both painting a positive picture of future ties - vowing to build a "new model of major country relationships" not focused on confrontation.

In eight hours of talks, Xi and Obama touched only lightly on longstanding sources of friction that have dominated previous high-level meetings between the countries, such as China's currency policy, the bilateral trade imbalance and human rights.

But that does not mean such frictions have been resolved and they may flare up again at next month's Sino-US strategic and economic dialogue in the US.

"The two nations have a deep mistrust of each other because they are engaged in competition or even confrontation on certain issues," said Professor Su Hao from China Foreign Affairs University. "The two leaders did not want to discuss too many specific issues at the summit. They wanted to enhance trust and settle strategic security issues first before proceeding to settle other frictions."

For the US, the issue of cybersecurity and allegations that Chinese institutions hacked into American networks remain near the top of the agenda. Beijing has denied responsibility for the cyberattacks and the two nations have established a working group to address the issue under the strategic and economic dialogue.