US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived here for talks Friday with Chinese leaders after vowing not to let human rights block progress on the global economic crisis, climate change and security. Clinton said there would be better opportunities for the United States and China to tackle current pressing issues like climate change rather than to bridge their long-standing gaps over human rights, including China's attitude towards Tibet.
"Successive administrations and Chinese governments have been poised back and forth on these (rights) issues and we have to continue to press them," Clinton told reporters in Seoul just before leaving for Beijing.
"But our pressing on those issues can't interfere on the global economic crisis, the global climate change crisis and the security crisis," she said. "We have to have a dialogue that leads to an understanding and co-operation on each of those," Clinton said ahead of her talks with her Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi as well as President Hu Jintao and Prime Minister Wen Jiabao.
Clinton said it was not yet known how the two sides would engage this weekend on the economic crisis, climate change and security issues such as extremism in Afghanistan and Pakistan. "So if we talk more about those, it's in large measure because that's where the opportunity for engagement is," Clinton said. "And that doesn't mean that we have any lesser concern about the need for China to be more willing to recognise and protect human rights of people," she said.
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