U.S. and China should keep ties on track, says China's ambassador

The United States and China should advance cooperation in various fields to keep moving the bilateral relationship forward on the right track, Chinese Ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai said on Wednesday.

Chinese Ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai delivers a speech at a dinner in New York on Nov. 20, 2017. [File Photo: China News Service via VCG/Liao Pan]

"One thing that we have learned from the past four decades is that both countries benefit from cooperation and lose in confrontation," Cui said at an event celebrating the 92nd anniversary of the founding of the People's Liberation Army of China.

Noting that the China-U.S. relationship is now at a crossroads, Cui said the recent meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Donald Trump in Osaka, Japan charted the course for the growth of bilateral relations based on coordination, cooperation and stability.

Both sides need to implement the consensuses of the two presidents with real actions, and advance cooperation in political, security, economic, trade, cultural, people-to-people and military fields, Cui said.

Cui said he was convinced that "the most powerful driving force" for China-U.S. relations comes from the two peoples' aspirations for a better life and for a sound and steady growth of the relations, and from international expectations for peace and friendship between the two countries.

China will follow the principle of non-conflict, non-confrontation, mutual respect and win-win cooperation and take a positive and prudent approach to military-to-military relations with the United States, so as to make them "a stabilizer" of the bilateral relationship and contribute to its development, the ambassador added.

Cui also stressed that China remains committed to peaceful development and a defense policy that is defensive in nature.

"China will never develop itself at the cost of other countries," said Cui, adding that neither will China allow others to undermine its core interests.