CHINA and the United States have agreed to open a new chapter of military dialogue, marking another cautious step forward in US President Bill Clinton's attempts to improve relations with Beijing.
''We discussed a number of modest initiatives for military dialogue and exchanges between us,'' Charles Freeman, the US Assistant Secretary of Defence for Regional Security Affairs, said yesterday, at the end of a day-and-a-half of talks with top Chinesemilitary officials.
Mr Freeman, a former US ambassador to China and the highest-ranking military official to visit Beijing since the 1989 massacre, said the exchanges would focus on the conversion of military facilities to civilian use, and on international peace-keeping.
The US envoy described the Chinese military officials he met as ''very open to the idea of resuming exchanges and engaging in a range of activities''.
According to Xinhua (the New China News Agency), the Vice-Chairman of the Central Military Commission, General Liu Huaqing - whom Mr Freeman met in Beijing -described the visit as ''a good beginning'' for improving bilateral military relations.
Since the Tiananmen Square massacre, Sino-US military contacts have been limited to lower ranking defence officials, and have excluded the sorts of exchange which the two sides now plan to resume.