The United States and China have resumed defense policy coordination talks that were suspended due to raised tensions between the two countries in 2022, the Pentagon said Tuesday.
During the two-day talks from Monday, deputy-level defense officials discussed issues ranging from promoting military-to-military communication as agreed by their leaders in November to Taiwan and Russia's war against Ukraine, according to the U.S. Defense Department.
The talks at the Pentagon marked the first time that representative of the two sides have met in person under the framework since January 2020, according to a senior U.S. defense official.
The meetings followed an agreement between U.S. President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in mid-November in San Francisco area to reopen military-to-military lines of communication at several levels.
Despite numerous areas of contention, the United States and China have recognized the need to prevent competition from turning into direct conflict.
High-level military communication channels had been closed since Beijing cut them in protest at a visit to Taiwan made in August 2022 by then-U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
During the latest discussions, Michael Chase, the Pentagon's deputy assistant secretary of defense for China, Taiwan and Mongolia, who led the U.S. delegation, raised the need for operational safety across the Indo-Pacific region, according to the Pentagon.
It said Chase reaffirmed that the United States will continue to sail, fly and operate responsibly wherever international law permits, while noting that Washington's commitment to its allies in the region remains ironclad.
On Taiwan, which Beijing claims as part of its territory, Chase reiterated Washington's longtime "one-China policy," which recognizes the People's Republic of China as the sole legal government of China.
But he also underscored that peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait is vital, it said.
Maj. Gen. Song Yanchao, deputy director of the Central Military Commission's Office for International Military Cooperation, represented China at the talks, which were launched in 2005.
China's Defense Ministry said its side urged the United States to stop selling weapons to Taiwan and to oppose independence for the island.
Using a more hawkish tone than the Pentagon announcement, the ministry's brief statement was filled with various demands it made to the U.S. delegation, which also included a call on the United States to reduce its military deployments and "provocative" actions in the South China Sea.
China claims control over a large swath of the South China Sea and continues to build up its naval capacity, with tensions especially escalating with the Philippines in recent months.
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