U.S. bent on having its plane back

By Sridhar Krishnaswami

NEW YORK, APRIL 18. The Bush administration is not commenting on the first round of talks in Beijing on the return of the EP-3E surveillance plane and other related issues. The talks between U.S. and Chinese officials lasted for about three hours.

The officials of both sides are now said to have recessed for the day with the second round expected to begin on Thursday. But one report has it that the U.S. has told China that further talks can take place only if there was ``progress'' on the return of the spy plane.

The tone of the first meeting of senior officials is said to be crucial for, this would be setting the parameters of the bilateral relationship in the short run as well as from the longer term point of view. The tenor of the meeting will also have an impact on the immediate issues before the two countries ranging from trade, human rights and arms sales to Taiwan.

The State Department, the White House and the Pentagon have been stressing in the last several days that Washington expects the Chinese to hand over the crippled EP-3E plane now at a military base in the Hainan Island. ``We want our airplane back, and we're going to make that point, and we would expect to get a response,'' the State Department spokesman, Mr. Richard Boucher, said prior to the formal start of the talks in Beijing.

Senior administration officials representing the United States in the Beijing talks were expecting to have ``frank'' discussions with their counterparts. And the White House had already indicated that the U.S. team would be posing some ``tough questions.''

The American team went fully prepared intending to show that the EP-3E was not at fault for the collision over the South China Sea on April 1. In fact the Pentagon on Tuesday released video clips showing the Chinese fighter pilot, Wang Wei, flying dangerously close to American planes on earlier missions. The Chinese have all along rejected this contention and reports from Beijing say that their officials made this point all over again at the first round.

Meanwhile, it is being reported that the President, Mr. George W. Bush, has been informed by his National Security team that the highly sophisticated naval radar system should not be a part of the arms package deal to Taiwan. There has been pressure on the Bush White House to sell four Aegis class destroyers to Taiwan.

But apparently the National Security team was determined that Taiwan did not have the necessary technical skill to operate the weapons system which would protect it from a missile attack. Mr. Bush is expected to finalise a decision by next week and the expectation is that Taiwan will be getting a powerful and a sophisticated arms package but minus the Aegis class destroyers.

The Bush administration has also named its envoy to China with the President selecting a lawyer, businessman and former classmate at Yale. Mr. Clark Randt, said to be fluent in Mandarin and who was at one time posted to the American Mission in Beijing in the 1980s, will be replacing Admiral Joseph Prueher. Mr. Randt was also a member of the national steering committee for the 1988 Presidential campaign of the present President's father, Mr. George H.W. Bush.

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Section  : International
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