US must seize opportunity of China's reforms: Obama aide

Chinese medics check the condition of a US soldier in a joint disaster-relief drill on Thursday at Bellows Air Force Station on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. [Photo by Yu Wei/China Daily]

WASHINGTON - Seeking to boost economic ties with China, the United States must seize the opportunity of Beijing's newly launched "sweeping reforms," a key aide to President Barack Obama said Wednesday.

China's economic reforms, if realized, "could go a long way toward leveling the playing field for private and foreign investors and moving China's economy toward market principles," said Susan Rice, Obama's national security adviser.

China released a key reform roadmap last week aiming to build a united and open market system with orderly competition, and enabling the market to play a "decisive" role in allocating resources.

"That's an opportunity we must seize," Rice said in an address on "America's Future in Asia" at Georgetown University.

The United States seeks to build a new model of major-country relationship with China, which means "managing inevitable competition while forging deeper cooperation on issues where our interests converge -- in Asia and beyond."

Rice, former US ambassador to the United Nations, said despite the differences between the two countries, their interests on many of the major challenges can and should be more closely aligned.