Xi and Obama agree on cybercrime cooperation meetings as threat of sanctions of alleged theft of trade secrets looms
Agreement between presidents takes discussion to higher level but analysts say substantial results needed to consider it a breakthrough
China and the United States have agreed to help each other out on investigations into cyberspying and theft, with senior security officials from both sides meeting regularly to assess progress.
After presidents Xi Jinping and Barack Obama met in Washington on Friday, the White House announced that the first of the meetings would be held later this year, to be followed by talks twice a year after that.
During a press conference by the two leaders, Xi said "China strongly opposes and combats the theft of commercial secrets and other kinds of hacking attacks".
The agreement comes amid mounting pressure on the Obama administration to impose economic sanctions on China for its alleged theft of trade secrets. Beijing has long accused Washington of being involved in the same activities, and suspended the only bilateral cybersecurity working group after the US indicted five People's Liberation Army officers for allegedly stealing trade secrets last year.
The presidents said both sides had agreed to cooperate with requests for information and help to investigate malicious cyberactivity from their territory.
"We have … made significant progress in agreeing to … how we are going to go after individuals or entities engaging in cybercrimes or cyberattacks," Obama said. "The question now is, are words followed by actions?"
