The development of Sino-US friendship and cooperation will not only bring benefits to the two peoples but also be conducive to peace and stability in Asia and the world at large, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said during an interview given to The Washington Post in Beijing Friday.  

At least three conclusions can be drawn from the past years of the history of Sino-US relationship, Wen told Leonard Downie, executive editor of the American newspaper.

First, cooperation will bring benefits to both nations, whereas confrontation will hurt both sides. Second, there exists a good basis of cooperation and common interests between China and the United States. Third, friendship and cooperation between the two sides is conducive to peace and stability not only in the Asia-Pacific region, but also throughout the world.

Last year, President Jiang Zemin visited the United States, and this year, President Hu Jintao has met President Bush twice. The Chinese side has explicitly stated its desire to further improve and develop its relations with the United States.

The United States is the most developed country in the world. China is the most populous developing country in the world. "To develop friendship and cooperation between these two countries will not only bring benefits to our two peoples but also be conducive to peace and stability in Asia and the world at large," said he.

"In 1972, farsighted leaders on the two sides opened the door for exchanges between us, and put an end to 23 years of estrangement and no contact. That started the peaceful coexistence between us. Despite the many ups and downs we have experienced, our relationship has moved forward."

Wen said he had not made an official visit to the United States, but had been there during a stopover on his way to South American countries and spent a few days in New York and in Los Angeles.

He said his biggest hobby was reading. "I don't know how to live without books. They're my best companion," said he.

Wen recalled a meeting with the President of the Republic of Korea, Mr. Roh Moo-hyun. "He told me that in his inauguration speech, he quoted President Abraham Lincoln from one of his speeches in 1861. So after the meeting, I went back home and looked for the book about Abraham Lincoln on my bookshelf, and I found that paragraph. In the very same paragraph, I had already used red pencil to underline these lines."

Lincoln wrote, "The mystic cords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when touched again, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."

"So my understanding is that Lincoln's approach to the Civil War had an impact, an influence on President Roh Moo-hyun on how he's going to address the problems between the North and the South," Wen said, adding that President Roh wants to see reconciliation between the two.

(Xinhua News Agency November 24, 2003)