The impending meeting between Xi Jinping and Barack Obama in California is generating keen interest among observers in the United States.

 

　　CRI's Washington correspondent Lv Xiaohong has more.

 

　　The Chinese president's visit to the US has generated a lot of interest in Washington. Many believe the meeting between Presidents Xi and Obama will pave the way for improved Sino-US relations.

 

　　Stapleton Roy was a former US Ambassador to China:

 

　　"Many of us who follow US-China relations felt that it is important after President Obama's re-election to his second term and after you have the change of leadership in China for the new top leaders to meet as soon as possible. It's important for them to provide guidance to the governments of each country on how they want to handle the US-China relationship. So I think the issues they will discuss range from the big issues such as trying to create a new type of great power relationship between China and the United States that can stabilize strategic rivalry between the two countries down to the particular issues they have to discuss. Issues such as North Korea, issues such as the Middle East, issues such as our trade relations. I mean they have to deal both with strategic guidance to the relationship, and with the issues that reflects the day-to-day attitudes in each country that are very important."

 

　　The main issues the leaders will discuss include Washington's so called pivot towards Asia, trade disputes and cyber espionage.

 

　　But Nobel laureate in economics Michael Spence of New York University thinks they should be talking about something else.

 

　　"We all hope that they will address a rather more fundamental question which is what do we want these two economies to look like and how do we want them to relate 10 years from now as a context of an ongoing process of the more detailed job for figuring out how we cooperate. This is not a one-shot effort. We're hoping this establishes a pattern of cooperation where we discover over time. The last thing we hope these two countries do is to think carefully about the roles they want to play as leaders in providing a global context that's stable."

 

　　Professor Spence says there are many areas within which the US and China can cooperate, such as energy efficiency, eco-friendly business and climate change.

 

　　But today's Sino-US cooperation stretches beyond economics and trade. US Navy Commander Admiral Samuel Locklear says good progress has also been made militarily, and there's room to push this further.

 

　　"I believe the best hope for sustained bilateral cooperation will come from strategically identifying those areas where our interests overlap and building, over time, greater understanding and trust between our two armed forces. Our approach is to manage the friction and disruptive competition and increase areas of congruence and cooperation between our two nations."

 

　　Admiral Locklear says the two countries agree on many more issues than they disagree. He urges the leaders to build on this fact to reduce the potential for conflict.

 

　　President Xi and President Obama will meet on Friday and Saturday in California. They'll be discussing ways to strengthen ties between the two countries. Even if they're not going to wear any.

 

　　For CRI, this is LXH in Washington.