It will be interesting to see the response from north Korea to these statements (anything from rhetoric to provocation to another nuke/missile test though perhaps not for some time). Just as China feels like the Asian Pivot is about containment of China, north Korea could now believe that there is a complete policy of containment by the international community with China on board (and I am skeptical as to how on board China is actually).
Mr. Obama and Mr. Xi also found areas of agreement over North Korea, which under pressure from China has muted a flurry of belligerent statements after nuclear and missile tests this year.
…
Mr. Obama’s administration has welcomed China’s new assertiveness with its neighbor and ally, believing that it reflects a new calculation that a constant state of crisis on the Korean Peninsula is destabilizing for the Chinese as well. The two presidents held a long discussion on North Korea over what Tom Donilon, Mr. Obama’s departing national security adviser, called “a very lively dinner” on Friday, and he said that they agreed that dealing with the country’s nuclear arsenal was a promising arena for “enhanced cooperation.”
“They agreed that North Korea has to denuclearize, that neither country will accept North Korea as a nuclear-armed state” and that their two nations would work together to achieve that through pressure on Pyongyang, Mr. Donilon said.
I do not expect north Korea to accept these statements lightly. I also wonder how much of the discussion focused on the collapse of the Kim Family Regime because if China were to apply the real pressure it would take to even have a chance of influencing north Korean behavior (let alone sufficient pressure to end its nuclear program) it will require economic and political "strangulation" of the regime and that could very well lead to regime collapse and all the severe consequences that we can expect.
V/R
Dave
U.S. and China Move Closer on North Korea, but Not on Cyberespionage
Evan Vucci/Associated Press
President Xi Jinping of China and President Obama took a walk Saturday on the grounds of the Sunnylands estate in California.
By JACKIE CALMES and STEVEN LEE MYERS
Published: June 8, 2013 73 Comments
RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. — Even as they pledged to build “a new model” of relations, President Obama and President Xi Jinping ofChina ended two days of informal meetings here on Saturday moving closer on pressuring a nuclear North Korea and addressing climate change, but remaining sharply divided over cyberespionage and other issues that have divided the countries for years.
Although the leaders of the world’s two biggest powers made no public statements on their second day of talks, their disagreements — over cyberattacks as well as arms sales to Taiwan, maritime territorial disputes in the South China Sea and manipulation of the Chinese currency — spilled into the open when senior officials from both countries emerged to describe the meetings in detail.
From the outset, the White House said the purpose of the meetings here was not to announce new deals or understandings — “deliverables,” in diplomatic parlance — but to create a more comfortable relationship between Mr. Obama and Mr. Xi, who took full power in March, that could avoid plunging the two nations into escalating conflict.
Even so, the White House announced that the two countries had reached at least one concrete accord that environmentalists welcomed as a potential step in combating climate change. China and the United States agreed to discuss ways to reduce emissions of hydrofluorocarbons, known as HFCs, that are used in refrigerants and insulating foams.
Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, one of several senior Democrats who urged Mr. Obama to raise the issue in these talks, praised the announcement. “A global phase-down of HFCs would eliminate more heat-trapping gases by 2050 than the United States emits in an entire decade,” he said in a statement.
Mr. Obama and Mr. Xi also found areas of agreement over North Korea, which under pressure from China has muted a flurry of belligerent statements after nuclear and missile tests this year. After suspending nearly all contact with South Korea, the North has in recent weeks reversed course, and on Sunday officials of the two countries are to meet at a border village to arrange the first cabinet minister-level meeting in six years.
Mr. Obama’s administration has welcomed China’s new assertiveness with its neighbor and ally, believing that it reflects a new calculation that a constant state of crisis on the Korean Peninsula is destabilizing for the Chinese as well. The two presidents held a long discussion on North Korea over what Tom Donilon, Mr. Obama’s departing national security adviser, called “a very lively dinner” on Friday, and he said that they agreed that dealing with the country’s nuclear arsenal was a promising arena for “enhanced cooperation.”
“They agreed that North Korea has to denuclearize, that neither country will accept North Korea as a nuclear-armed state” and that their two nations would work together to achieve that through pressure on Pyongyang, Mr. Donilon said.
The two presidents met for nearly eight hours beginning Friday evening, and appeared eager to redefine the relationship in a way that would allow their countries to overcome their economic, political and diplomatic differences, rather than letting new — or old — crises derail progress across the spectrum of issues.
On the most contentious issue in recent months — American accusations that Chinese corporations linked to the military had pilfered military and economic secrets and property in cyberspace — the officials seemed to speak past each other. That dominated Saturday’s talks here at a secluded estate, but ended without a clear acknowledgment by Mr. Xi of any culpability.
China’s state councilor, Yang Jiechi, said China strongly opposed hacking and cyberespionage and was itself a victim, while Mr. Donilon warned that the threat from China threatened to constrain the spirit of partnership Mr. Obama and Mr. Xi publicly declared they wanted.
Mr. Obama warned that if the hacking continued, Mr. Donilon said, it “was going to be a very difficult problem in the economic relationship.”
(Continued at the link below)
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