Chinese media stress importance of Hu trip

BEIJING, Jan. 16 (UPI) -- Chinese official media, Xinhua and China Daily, stressed that President Hu Jintao's U.S. trip will help promote strategic cooperation and mutual trust.

The visit starting Tuesday is "expected to lay out a blueprint for future China-U.S. relations … with American leaders," said a lengthy article in Xinhua.

It said Hu's visit is "committed to further enhancing the strategic mutual trust," and noted that it is "sure to offer additional clue" to the question, "Is China a strategic rival or a cooperative partner?"

The China Daily article by the director of the John L. Thornton China Center said Hu's visit will "be especially important for recalibrating the tone and direction of U.S.-China ties" as problems had arisen since the November 2009 China visit by U.S. President Barack Obama.

It said the Obama visit had raised the importance of mutual trust but since then "distrust seems to have grown."

The report said from an American perspective, "China's international tone has toughened, it has rapidly increased its capacity for military power projection targeted at U.S. capabilities, and it is pursuing progressively more mercantilist economic policies."

From a Chinese perspective, it said, "the United States has engaged in protection of its home market and has moved in the diplomatic and security arenas to reassert its leadership of Asia and to make things more difficult for China in its relations with its neighbors."

The article warned if such mutual perceptions harden, "both sides are in for serious problems" as the two share strategic goals in such areas as global stability, economic growth and reducing terrorism threats.

Xinhua said: "The hard fact shows that mutual trust is vital to the common development as the two countries differ in political system, ideology and strategic goal."