Dialogue the key to stability

President Xi Jinping meets with his US counterpart Barack Obama on the sidelines of the Nuclear Security Summit in The Hague on March 24, 2014.

At a recent meeting of Chinese and US think tanks, how to maintain global and regional stability dominated the discussions.

Compared with the Chinese participants who focused on how to prevent conflicts and confrontation from sabotaging the safe international environment on which countries depend for peaceful development, their counterparts from the United States were more interested in how to maintain the established US-led global order and contain any challenge to it.

Despite the US efforts to retain its global dominance, especially after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the international situation continues to change. The economic strength of Asia-Pacific countries is growing, while the continuing integration in Europe and deepening cooperation among BRICS countries have advanced multi-polarization. Under these circumstances, the international community has been calling for the major powers to hold a strategic outlook that contributes to widespread stability and security, which benefits the peaceful development of all.

Peace and development are the trends of the times, and countries should abandon the Cold War mentality that focuses on the pursuit of military superiority and the development of military deterrence and military alliances.

Instead, all countries should nurture a new security approach that is focused on peaceful coexistence, mutual dependence, mutual benefit and friendly cooperation. Instead of confrontation, dialogue should be used to resolve situations in a predictable, controllable, positive and constructive way.

China's perspective for relations between countries is one of mutual trust and benign interactions. It believes countries should turn to the United Nations and other international organizations to deal with traditional and non-traditional security challenges and promote the peaceful settlement of disputes as a way of maintaining international and regional strategic stability.

The above is an abridgement of a People's Daily article published on Monday.