U.S. Treasury Secretary visits China amid escalating tensions over Iran

PanARMENIAN.Net - U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner will hold talks Wednesday, Jan 11, with Chinese leaders in Beijing to try to resolve differences with the resource-hungry Asian giant over oil imports from Iran.

His visit, which will also take in Japan, comes amid escalating international tensions over Iran's nuclear ambitions and a day after the United States accused Tehran of "blatant disregard for its responsibilities".

New U.S. sanctions, intended to put further pressure on Iran bar, any foreign banks that do business with its Iran's central bank from U.S. financial markets.

Iran's central bank is responsible for processing most oil purchases in the Islamic republic. But Geithner is likely to encounter strong resistance from China, which relies on Iran for 11 percent of its imported oil supplies and has repeatedly opposed the sanctions.

Vice foreign minister Cui Tiankai said this week that China's trade relations with Iran had nothing to do with Tehran's nuclear program.

"We should not mix issues of a different nature, and China's legitimate concerns and demands should be respected," he said.

Geithner is also expected to raise the issue of China's currency in meetings Wednesday with Premier Wen Jiabao and Vice-President Xi Jinping, who is tipped to be the next head of state, AFP reported.

Washington argues that Beijing's decision to keep the yuan artificially low fuels a flow of cheap exports that helped send the US trade deficit with China to more than $270 billion in 2010.