Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said Thursday that during Chinese President Jiang Zemin's visit to the United States in October, the presidents of China and the United States agreed that the two countries would resume military and other exchanges in the near future.

The spokesman said the two sides had agreed that the fifth China-US consultations on defense at vice-defence minister level will be held on December 9 and 10 in Washington D.C., the US capital. Xiong Guangkai, deputy chief of General Staff of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, would head a delegation to the consultations.

The two sides would exchange views on international and regional affairs, relations between the two nations and the two armies, and other issues of common concern, Liu said.

Meanwhile, the two countries had also agreed to hold the 13th China-US human rights talks in Beijing in mid-December. The Chinese representative would be Li Baodong, director of the international department of the Foreign Ministry, and his US counterpart would be Lorne W. Crane, assistant secretary for democracy, human rights and labor of the State Department.

(Xinhua News Agency December 6, 2002)