US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will meet with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations gathering, a US State Department official said on Tuesday.
The two will meet in Manila, where foreign ministers from the 11-member ASEAN and major partners have gathered this week to discuss a range of global issues.
Analysts have said a Rubio meeting with his Chinese counterpart was likely to focus on preparations for a second meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping after the two met last May.
Trump has said Xi will visit the US at the end of September, and Rubio on Sunday said that the summit was still anticipated.
"I have no reason to believe that they won’t be coming. It’s important," he told reporters as he departed for ASEAN.
Tense US-China relations have stabilized under a temporary trade truce reached by Trump and Xi in October, but deep differences still define ties between the two nations, which many analysts see mired in a new form of Cold War.
"There are always going to be irritants, there are always going to be things we don’t agree on, but I think it’s incumbent on powerful and important countries like ours to continue to talk and have a relationship," Rubio told reporters.
