Top Chinese envoy calls for 'right choices' in US-China ties

Ambassador Cui Tiankai: China, US 'have far more common interests than disparities'

China-US relations have again come to a crossroads in history, and the two sides need to jointly make the "right choices" for the future, Chinese Ambassador to the US Cui Tiankai said at a reception in Washington.

"Looking ahead, China and the United States remain to have far more common interests than disparities, far greater cooperation than frictions, and we should never have our bilateral relations defined by so-called 'competition', derailed to the wrong path of 'de-coupling', let alone dipping into the abyss of 'confrontation'," the ambassador said.

The top envoy made the remarks on Wednesday at a gathering of more than 600 representatives of Chinese enterprises and those Chinese who live or study in the US, to celebrate the Lunar New Year, which falls on Feb 5.

Since the beginning of 2019, which marks the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Beijing and Washington, Cui has warned against what he called the misunderstanding of "competition" or attempts pushed by some in the US to delink the world's top two economies.

On Jan 18, at an event at the Carter Center in Atlanta to commemorate the 40th anniversary, Cui said the concept of competition is much talked about nowadays as people examine relations between the two countries.

"Originally 'competition' is not a bad word in both the Chinese and English languages. But now too much has been read into it," he said.

Some people believe that any competition is of a strategic nature and can only be a zero-sum game, that competitors are by definition rivals and adversaries and that there should be a predetermined winner in competition and that winner shall take all, he said.

"This is a gross distortion of the spirit of fair competition and should be firmly rejected in our relations," he told participants at the Atlanta international symposium.

As to the clamoring by some in the US for separating the Chinese economy from the US economy, Cui earlier said that the two largest economies are so interdependent and have such shared responsibility to the global economy that they couldn't just be disengaged.

Such thinking is against the trends of the time and will harm the US economy as well, serving only to "lift a rock to drop on their own feet", he said in an interview with the China Global Television Network on Jan 16.

At the Wednesday reception, Cui said that for 40 years, growth of China-US relations has not only achieved a mutually beneficial situation, which allows both societies to "win" together, it has also contributed tremendously to world peace and development.

More than 14,000 people are flying between the two countries every day, and both countries have been engaged in "fruitful" exchanges and cooperation at the bilateral, regional and global levels, he said.

The ambassador said that Chinese people have natural and unalienable rights to pursue happiness, and China's development, which is an opportunity and blessing to the world, never comes at the cost of other nations.

Cui again said China is ready to pursue a China-US relationship based on coordination, cooperation and stability.

Contact the writer at huanxinzhao@chinadailyusa.com