Page 6 - Aruba Today
P. 6
A6
U.S. NEWSFriday 25 September 2015
Xi trades football for hardball political negotiations
GENE JOHNSON during his 48-hour stay in Vice President Joe Biden gestures toward Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan
PHUONG LE Seattle, during which he during an arrival ceremony in Andrews Air Force Base, Md., Thursday, Sept. 24, 2015. Chinese
Associated Press toured Boeing’s plant in President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan are traveling to Washington for a State Visit.
SEATTLE (AP) — With his Everett, visited Microsoft’s
feel-good tours of Boeing, campus in Redmond, and (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
Microsoft and a local high received a football jersey
school complete, Chinese with his name on it from
President Xi Jinping departs high school students in Ta-
Washington state Thursday coma.
for the other Washington, In his public remarks, at a
where tougher discussions dinner banquet and at a
on cybersecurity, intellec- meeting of top corporate
tual property protections leaders from both nations,
and human rights await. Xi stressed the importance
President Barack Obama’s of U.S.-China business re-
administration said this lations and vowed that
week that he won’t pa- his country would work to
per over disagreements remove barriers to foreign
between the two coun- investment and to improve
tries on those topics, even intellectual property pro-
as the leaders find ground tections.
where they can work to- He also expressed a will-
gether on other issues, in- ingness to work with the
cluding trade and climate U.S. on cybersecurity — a
change. priority for Washington.
Xi struck a gracious tone White House officials have
said hacking attacks origi- Mushawn Knowles, who Treasury Secretary Henry
nating from China are ap- presented the jersey to Xi. Paulson, whose organiza-
proaching epidemic levels. “And hopefully we can tion, the Paulson Institute,
The administration believes have influence on him to organized the gathering.
Chinese espionage was love football.” Paulson noted the dif-
behind one of the worst U.S. Xi had presents of his own, ficult issues and increas-
government data breach- giving the school books ing tensions facing the
es in history, the theft of about his country, a ping nations as he welcomed
the personnel and security pong table and balls, and Xi. But Paulson added:
clearance records of tens inviting 100 students to be “The reason that the U.S.
of millions of government his guests in China. and China have a nearly
employees, contractors Xi is scheduled to arrive $600 billion trading rela-
and their friends and fami- Thursday afternoon in tionship, large amounts of
lies. On Wednesday, the Washington, D.C. He and U.S. investment in China,
Office of Personnel Man- Obama are scheduled to and increasing amounts of
agement announced that have a private dinner be- Chinese direct investment
an estimated 5.6 million fin- fore Obama formally wel- here, is because there are
gerprint images were sto- comes Xi and his wife at many areas where our na-
len — not 1.1 million as first the White House for the of- tional and business interests
thought. ficial state visit Friday. align.” Xi agreed. Though
“Problems are always out- Apple Chief Executive Tim he acknowledged hiccups
numbered by solutions,” Xi Cook, Microsoft CEO Sa- as China shifts its economy
said Wednesday as he ad- tya Nadella, Amazon’s Jeff from one driven by exports
dressed the business lead- Bezos, investor Warren Buf- to one driven by a grow-
ers. fett and Jack Ma of Chi- ing middle class, Xi told the
He received an enthusi- nese e-commerce giant group that China’s econo-
astic reception at Lincoln Alibaba were among the my will maintain a “steady
High School in Tacoma, 30 executives who attend- medium and high speed of
where students gave him ed Xi’s Seattle address on growth for a long time.”
a football and a personal- Wednesday. The speech “China will open up still
ized jersey. followed a closed-door wider to the outside
“He said it’ll fit him really discussion Wednesday world,” Xi said through an
well,” said 17-year-old moderated by former U.S. interpreter.q
