When Janet Yellen met Chinese Vice Premier Liu He in January in Zurich, they both agreed to enhance communication about macroeconomic and financial issues. Photo: AFP / Getty Images
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says she still hopes to visit China but she is not providing any details on plans or timing.
A team of US Treasury officials was scheduled to travel to China this month to prepare for a visit by Yellen, but that was before a diplomatic row over a Chinese balloon that Washington claims was spying on the United States. The US shot down the balloon on Saturday.
The United States held briefings in Washington and Beijing with foreign diplomats from 40 nations about the Chinese balloon.
Its appearance over the US last week caused political outrage in Washington and prompted Secretary of State Antony Blinken to cancel a trip to Beijing that both countries had hoped would patch their frayed relations. Blinken had been originally scheduled to arrive in Beijing on Sunday.
Yellen, speaking to reporters on Wednesday, said it was important to improve communications with Chinese counterparts on economic issues.
"I still hope to be able to visit China to meet with economic counterparts. But I don't have any detail to offer you on just when, and I really think that's up to State (department) and DOD (Department of Defence)," Yellen said, noting that she did meet with her Chinese counterpart in Zurich on the way to Africa.
Yellen told reporters that the risk of recession in the US remained low, largely because of the strong job market. "When you have a 3.4 percent unemployment rate, which is the lowest since 1969 and you have over 500,000 jobs created in January, this is not an economy that is anywhere near recession."
A US Air Force fighter jet shot down the balloon off the South Carolina coast on Saturday, a week after it first entered US airspace. China's foreign ministry has said it was a weather balloon that had blown off course and accused the United States of overreacting.
When Yellen met Chinese Vice Premier Liu He in January in Zurich, they both agreed to enhance communication about macroeconomic and financial issues.
- Reuters
