Letters | Why the time is right for China and the US to break the ice: it’s never a good time for a fight

Name: How the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou soured China's relations with the US and Canada
Uploaded: 2021-07-29T21:00:29.000Z
Duration: 4 min 43 s
Description: How the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou soured China's relations with the US and Canada

China has presented the US with two clear lists. When some or all of the requests have been fulfilled, long-fraught relations can return to normal

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A US embassy car waits outside the Tianjin hotel where American and Chinese officials are expected to hold talks, in Tianjin on July 25. The talks included a four-hour meeting between Chinese foreign vice-minister Xie Feng and US deputy secretary of state Wendy Sherman. Photo: AP

Letters

Published: 5:00am, 30 Jul 2021Updated: 10:59am, 30 Jul 2021

On July 26, meetings between Chinese and US officials were held in Tianjin, where foreign vice-minister Xie Feng held talks with US deputy secretary of state Wendy Sherman lasting about four hours. Xie presented Sherman with two lists: one of “errors” the United States needed to address, the other of issues Beijing considers important.

Unsurprisingly, after the previous round of discussions in Alaska, Chinese diplomats took a firm stance at home.

In the first list, Xie invited the US government to withdraw the visa restrictions and sanctions imposed on Chinese officials and their families. The US was urged to stop suppressing Chinese-invested enterprises and Confucius Institutes and to remove visa restrictions on Chinese students.

Another item on the first list called for the US to drop its extradition request for Huawei Technologies Co. financial chief Meng Wanzhou.

It has been 2 ½ years since Meng was arrested during a layover at Vancouver International Airport. Meng is accused of defrauding HSBC by lying about Huawei’s business dealings in Iran, thus putting the bank at risk of breaching US sanctions on the country. She is fighting the US extradition request. Recently, the Canadian court rejected her evidence.

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How the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou soured China's relations with the US and Canada

The second list included concerns about racial discrimination in the US, with suggestions that the US safeguard the rights of Chinese citizens working and doing business on American soil. Other items discussed included matters in relation to Hong Kong, Taiwan, the South China Sea, and so on.

.css-sioo19{color:#c79a00;}Letters | Why the time is right for China and the US to break the ice: it’s never a good time for a fight

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;} China has presented the US with two clear lists. When some or all of the requests have been fulfilled, long-fraught relations can return to normal

Letters | Why the time is right for China and the US to break the ice: it’s never a good time for a fight

China has presented the US with two clear lists. When some or all of the requests have been fulfilled, long-fraught relations can return to normal