New US envoy a positive sign for ties, says state media

BEIJING: US President-elect Donald Trump’s pick of Iowa Gov Terry Branstad as ambassador to China sends a positive sign for ties, Chinese state media said, but the envoy will have to live up to earlier statements rejecting confrontation with Beijing.

The appointment of Mr Branstad, seen in China as a longstanding friend who first forged ties with President Xi Jinping 30 years ago during an agricultural research trip to Iowa, may help ease trade tension between the world’s two largest economies, diplomats and trade experts have said.

But the move comes even as Mr Trump has directed fiery rhetoric at China, and surrounded himself with advisers and cabinet members who advocate a tough line on Beijing.

Mr Branstad had rejected China-bashing campaign rhetoric in an interview during Mr Xi’s 2015 state visit to the US, China’s official Xinhua news agency said.

Xinhua cited the governor as saying he was “hopeful” the next president would “lead to additional cooperation, additional trade and not confrontation” with China.

“Now it is his turn to walk his talk together with Trump,” the news agency said in a commentary yesterday. “His expertise on China and friendship with Chinese and US leaders are expected to facilitate him in lubricating the development of the most important bilateral relationship in the world.”

Mr Branstad’s nomination, if confirmed, “will be a positive move made by Trump toward a healthy and stable relationship between Beijing and Washington”, it added.

China’s foreign ministry has called Mr Branstad an “old friend of the Chinese people”, and welcomed his selection.

Mr Trump has said that when he takes office he intends to declare China a currency manipulator, meaning it keeps the yuan artificially low to make its exports cheap, and has threatened punitive tariffs on Chinese goods going into the US.

Added to that, his unusual decision to

accept a call from Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen this month provoked a diplomatic protest from Beijing, which sees Taiwan as a renegade province.

Mr Branstad’s nomination, which will be formally made once Mr Trump is sworn in on Jan 20, was well received in the US.

Then Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping and Iowa Gov Terry Branstad raise their glasses at a formal dinner at the Iowa Statehouse in Des Moines in 2012.