President Hu Jintao says China and the United States should enhance communication and coordination, when meeting US President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Honolulu, Hawaii, on Saturday. [Jim Watson / Agence France-Presse]

HONOLULU / WASHINGTON - President Hu Jintao said it is "all the more important" for China to develop communication and coordination with the United States amid "complicated world situations" in a meeting with US President Barack Obama on Saturday.

Hu said the Asia-Pacific region, which he described as the greatest potential for development in the world, should be an important area for active Sino-US cooperation.

Hu made the remarks in the meeting with Obama during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders' Meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii, over the weekend.

Hu arrived in Honolulu with other Asia-Pacific leaders to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders' Meeting.

This is their ninth meeting since Obama assumed office in early 2009. Hu said the world is experiencing increasing uncertainty and instability in economic development and regional security threats.

Hu called for better communication with the US to better settle sensitive issues. Obama said it is the first time that he and Hu have had a full range of discussions after Hu's state visit to the US in January.

Obama said although there are areas where the two countries will continue to have differences, he has confidence that bilateral ties will develop in a constructive way. He said the two largest economies in the world should cooperate not only for the sake of the two nations but also for the Asia-Pacific region.

He said many countries in the region also want stability in the ties between China and the US. China and the US now stand as each other's second largest trade partner, with trade volume rising 150 times to $385 billion in 2010 since they established diplomatic ties in 1979.

The US continues to be the top source of foreign direct investment for China and China has become the biggest foreign creditor for the US.

In a meeting between Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday, Yang said the meeting between Hu and Obama would be "of great significance to the steady development of China-US relations".

Clinton said the US values its partnership with China, which is not only in the interests of both sides, but also of great importance to the world.

But the world's two largest economies have not always seen eye to eye. In the most recent trade measures against China, the US is investigating Chinese solar photovoltaic companies for alleged government subsidies.

Hu warned that politicizing trade frictions and resorting to protectionism should not be the means to address trade disputes between China and the US in a speech made to US business leaders on Thursday.

Philip Sharp, president of Resources for the Future, a Washington-based nonprofit and nonpartisan organization, said at a forum earlier this week that people in the US are becoming obsessed with China, "sometimes in a paranoid fashion, but sometimes in a very positive, competitive fashion".

The paranoia happens "when a country faces economic and political competition. There will be some people that worry excessively about that," said Theodore Roosevelt IV, board chair of Center for Climate and Energy Solutions.

"Good political leadership in my opinion will recognize that many of our interests with China coincide and converge. We want to have as much economical cooperation with you as possible as we can," Roosevelt said.

"If it becomes trade war and trade barriers for us versus China, we all lose in that scenario," said J. Wayne Leonard, chairman and CEO of Entergy Corporation, the second-largest nuclear generator in the US. "We are all on this together."

China Daily