U.S. President Barack Obama's just-concluded trip to China once again demonstrated that U.S.-China
relations are very broad and deep, president of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, Stephen A. Orlins, said Wednesday.
"I am pleased with the broad range of issues covered at the summit between our two leaders," Orlins said in an exclusive interview with Xinhua,
adding that "it's becoming a very broad and deep relationship."
Obama is the first U.S. president to pay a state visit to China during his first year in office. China is the third leg of the president's ongoing Asia trip.
Commenting on Obama's China visit, Orlins said: "If you look at the joint communique, particularly the length of it, and the number of issues discussed, you will find our relations are intertwined."
Orlins speaks fluent Mandarin and is a member of the U.S. State Department legal team that created the framework for the historic
establishment of the U.S.-China diplomatic ties in 1979.
"I am very pleased with the trip as it allowed our two leaders to know each other better," he said, noting the fact that Chinese President Hu Jintao will visit the United States early next year also is a sign that the
two countries are getting closer and closer.
"The more time they spend together, the better the results will be," he said, adding Obama's trip to China was "very positive."
Speaking of the U.S. foreign and China policies, Orlins said that Obama is "really reorienting U.S. policy globally," which is producing good results.
He highly commended China's effort in actively responding to the issue of global warming, saying China is "very responsive" to this critical issue.
"We are trying to reach an agreement and then we know how to proceed," he said.
The United States is taking a multilateral approach towards world affairs and making "multilateral efforts and China is part of those
efforts," he said. Therefore, "what this trip successfully did is what I think makes the United States and China read from the same play book on a
lot of issues."
Noting that the trip is "part of a process," he said it "can't be looked at alone, it needs to be considered as part of the process of the
Obama Administration changing American foreign policy globally as well as with respect to China."
"Many things still need a lot of work," he added. However, the two countries are making great efforts to deepen bilateral relations.
"No matter how, I should say this trip is further joining the United States and China closer together," he said.
Orlins also expressed his satisfaction with the Strategic and Economic Dialogue and other important meetings between the two countries, which he said would gradually remove major obstacles on the way ahead.