Henry Paulson (L) shakes hands with Hu Jintao
© AFP/File Elizabeth DalzielWASHINGTON (AFP) - Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke will head the party for the inaugural meeting of the new "strategic economic dialogue" with China, in Beijing December 14-15, the Treasury said.
Also in the US delegation will be Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman and US Trade Representative Susan Schwab.
The top US officials will address "assuring continued global growth, China's economic development and further integration into the world trading system, stable energy markets, and cooperation on the environment", the Treasury said.
Vice Premier Wu Yi will lead the Chinese negotiating team, while the US delegation will also hold talks with President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, it said.
The new dialogue was announced in September during a trip to Beijing by Paulson, who hailed the forum as a way of tackling the longer-term challenges to the world economy thrown up by China's headlong growth.
But speaking in London earlier Tuesday, Paulson acknowledged that "the need for greater currency flexibility" on the Chinese yuan was a short-term headache facing US-China relations.
The United States and other nations argue the yuan is made artificially weak, giving the Asian giant an unfair advantage in global trade.
The US trade deficit with China in September reached a record 23 billion dollars, one-third of the total US trade gap.
Paulson, addressing the Confederation of British Industry's annual conference, said US relations with China had suffered from "a fair amount of tension" over perceptions that their bilateral trade is unfairly skewed.
The new strategic dialogue, he said, needed to take "a longer-term approach to China's ability to move ahead quickly with reforms, such as pursuing the rule of law, opening up their markets even further".
Aside from the currency issue, China stands accused by many in Washington of shutting off its markets to US goods and of turning a blind eye to rampant violations of US intellectual property rights (IPR).
Schwab, the US trade chief, warned Tuesday that China could be subject to more legal action at the WTO after the United States, Europe and Canada launched a joint complaint over trade in auto parts.
"We're looking seriously at additional cases unless China fulfills its WTO commitments," she said in a speech to the US Chamber of Commerce.
The administration is coming under greater pressure to get tough with China after the Democratic party regained control of Congress in elections this month.
"The elections results foretell what may be greater challenges to those in the US who believe in more open global markets," Commerce Secretary Gutierrez said during a mid-November visit to Shanghai.
Gutierrez also warned that Chinese pirating of US goods was weakening American support for a deeper trade relationship.
According to an annual report by the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a bipartisan panel of experts appointed by Congress, the administration should sue China at the WTO over IPR violations.
Coming just after the US elections, the commission's report was a wake-up call to the administration, Democratic Senator Charles Schumer said.
"The fragile consensus for free trade in America will fall apart unless China, either on its own initiative or because of pressure from our country, starts to play fair," he warned.
©AFP