China-US talks on trade, commerce conclude with fruitful outcomes

Visiting Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang (C), US Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker (L) and US Trade Representative Michael Froman pose for photos before the 25th Plenary Session of China-US Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade (JCCT) in Chicago, the United States, Dec 18, 2014. Chinese and American government officials on Thursday met for annual trade talks in Chicago, a city in the US state of Illinois, in hope of boosting future cooperation potential. [Photo/Xinhua]

CHICAGO - The latest round of the annual China-US high-level talks on trade and commerce ended here Thursday afternoon, with both sides hailing the "important consensus and outcomes" they achieved as well as the significant changes they introduced to the decades-old mechanism.

The 2014 China-US Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade (JCCT), also known as the 25th JCCT session, opened Tuesday in this US Midwest metropolis and co-chaired by Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang and US Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker and Trade Representative Michael Froman. US Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack also attended.

It was the last major bilateral event in a year that marks the 35th anniversary of the establishment of China-US diplomatic ties. It also came on the heels of US President Barack Obama's Beijing tour in November, during which he and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to further push the building of a "new model of major-country relationship" between the world's two largest economies.

"This JCCT session added a perfect finishing touch to this year's development of China-US relations, and also laid a solid foundation for our bilateral economic and trade cooperation next year and in the long run," Wang, who arrived in Chicago Tuesday, told the American hosts during their initial talks.

He also expressed the belief that China and the United States have much more common interests than differences, and that their economic and trade cooperation will prosper as long as the two countries can "seek common ground while reserving differences" in the spirit of mutual respect, mutual understanding and mutual accommodation.

Sources with the Chinese delegation told Xinhua that during the session, the US side also repeatedly emphasized the significance of US-China cooperation for both economies and the world economy at large, and expressed its readiness to work with the Chinese side on the basis of mutual respect and mutual benefit to lift economic and trade ties to a new height.