China's Xi Jinping meets with Obama: Will it be a 'Nixon goes to China' moment?
Some hope that it could be.
Some hope that it could be.
President聽Obama聽and China鈥檚 President聽Xi Jinping聽will meet for at least six hours聽this weekend in a rare, informal t锚te-a-t锚te that some say could reshape the relationship between the two world powers.
Not since 1972, when Nixon went to China, have leaders from China and the US sat down for more than a carefully scripted visit lasting more than an hour or so. And Asia-watchers are hoping this unscripted, two-day Sino-US summit ( allowing for an extended six-hour meeting) will have equally dramatic consequences.
鈥淎 second great breakthrough in the relationship has become a Holy Grail,鈥� Orville Schell, head of the Asia Society鈥檚 Center for US-China Relations in New York, told the Monitor''s Beijing bureau chief, 鈥淥f course it鈥檚 hard to do, but that鈥檚 their aspiration.鈥�
The Monitor's Peter Ford points out that the second meeting for the two leaders (when Xi was still China's vice president he met with Obama briefly) comes at key time for the US and China:
Still,聽writes the Monitor's Howard LeFranchi in Washington, not everyone is expecting immediate change, particularly if such urgent issues as cybersecurity are not substantially addressed:
For the rest of the story on聽the "great new power relationship" between China and the US, click here.