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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in China this week rather than at the Democratic National Convention, and shes not getting nearly as warm a welcome as the party faithful might have given.
Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping, regarded as the nations next leader, did not show up for a press conference with Clinton this morning.
Clintons scheduled talk this morning with Vice President Xi Jinping had been called off by the Chinese side, Times Hannah Beech explains, so Clinton had another press conference with the Chinese foreign minister in which she sidestepped a question about whether Xis cancellation might reflect tensions between the worlds two biggest economies at a time when competing territorial claims in waters off China have marred the Peoples Republics relations with its maritime neighbors.
Addressing the media after the Communist Partys 18th national congress formalized his appointment as party general-secretary and military chief, Xi raised eyebrows with his frank admission of failings. Under the new conditions, our party faces many severe challenges, and there are also many pressing problems within the party that need to be resolved, particularly corruption, taking bribes, being divorced from the people, going through formalities and bureaucracy caused by some party officials, he said. To address these problems, we must first of all conduct ourselves honorably, Xi said. Our responsibility is to work with all the comrades in the party to uphold the principle that the party should supervise its own conduct and run itself with strict discipline, effectively solve major problems in the party, improve our conduct and maintain close ties with the people.
Xi also said the Chinese people wanted better education and health care, jobs and higher incomes, and a better environment. But in comments that will jar in Tibet and Xinjiang in particular also claimed that China was a country where all ethnic groups live in harmony. Although many in the United States and other nations are watching Chinas transition closely, Xis statement had little to say on Chinas relations with the rest of the world. There was only a vague reference to China standing rock-firm in the family of nations and making an even greater contribution to mankind, as well as a closing appeal to media organizations to make more efforts and contributions to deepening the mutual understanding between China and countries of the world.
An editorial Friday in Peoples Daily, a Communist Party mouthpiece, said a report presented to the partys congress had spelled out the future direction of Chinas relations with other countries. Peaceful development is Chinas basic state policy, and win-win cooperation is a banner for Chinas friendly relations with other countries, it said. At the same time, the country will resolutely safeguard its national sovereignty, security, and core interests. The two policies are two pillars of Chinese diplomacy, and do not conflict with each other. The leadership transition that took place during the national congress saw Xi elevated to party secretary-general as well as the position of chairman of the partys Central Military Commission (CMC), a body mostly made up of senior generals overseeing the Peoples Liberation Army.
In contrast, Xis two predecessors, Hu Jintao and Jiang Zemin, both became head of the CMC only some time after they were appointed party secretary-general in Jiangs case five months later, in Hus case almost two years later. The Communist Party-affiliated Global Times quoted Huang Weiping, director of the Institute of Contemporary Chinese Politics Research in Shenzhen, as saying it was a pleasing surprise that on this occasion the outgoing leader had not held onto military power after handing over top party post. Its a great step forward in political civilization, Huang commented. The new party leader now commands the military, not the other way around. It meets the standards of a modern country that aims at the rule of law.
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Envisaged targets include space debris and Chinese space launches, a U.S. defense official told reporters after the announcement was made in Perth, Western Australia on Wednesday. The Pentagon has expressed concern in recent years over advances in Chinas space and counter-space capabilities, particularly after Beijing in 2007 launched a ground-based ballistic missile to destroy a Chinese weather satellite in orbit, some 500 miles above the Earth. The successful test of an anti-satellite weapon made China just the third country, after the U.S. and Soviet Union, ever to have shot down an object in space.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and his Australian counterpart, Stephen Smith, agreed during Australia-United States ministerial (Ausmin) talks in Perth to relocate a space surveillance telescope from New Mexico, and a U.S. Air Force C-band space surveillance radar from Antigua in the Caribbean. Both are expected to be based in remote northwestern Australia, at a communications station that was used by the U.S. Navy during the Cold War. Panetta said the decision, along with the possible establishment of a combined communications gateway in Western Australia, represented a major leap forward in bilateral space cooperation and an important new frontier in the United States rebalance to the Asia-Pacific region. We recognized the need to address the rising threat presented by increasing congestion in space from over 50 years of space activities and a significant rise in space debris, an Ausmin communique stated. In particular, we need to ensure our continued access to space assets for services critical to the functioning of modern economies, as well as for national security purposes.
The C-band radar will track space assets and debris in low-earth orbit and increase the coverage of space objects in the southern hemisphere. The space surveillance telescope (SST) will provide enhanced capability detecting and tracking of objects in what are known as geosynchronous orbits some 22,000 miles above the Earths surface according to its manufacturer, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
The agency said in a statement the 180,000 pound telescope will track and catalogue space debris and objects unique to the space above that region of the world that could threaten DoD satellites. Able to search an area in space the size of the United States in seconds, SST uses the first large curved charge coupled device focal array, it said. The system is capable of detecting a small laser pointer on top of New York Citys Empire State Building from a distance equal to Miami, Florida, DARPA said. These features combine to provide orders of magnitude improvements in field of view and scanning for deep space surveillance. The data captured by the telescope will be fed into a worldwide U.S. Air Force network that observes and catalogues space objects and warns on possible collisions between them. Data on small asteroid detection will also be provided to NASA and the scientific community.
The Pacific is big enough for all of us
