The Chinese Embassy in Belgium on Friday confirmed Deng Jingquan, a young Chinese entrepreneur and frequent traveler, was killed in Tuesday's blasts in Brussels that took 34 lives and injured about 250. A young American couple, Justin Shults and his wife Stephanie Shults, have also been identified as victims.

It's a mournful moment. The rising terrorist threats the world is facing are clear. The young lives taken away by terrorist bombings cast a spotlight on the urgent need for China and the US, the world's two largest powers, to broaden cooperation in fighting terrorism.

China and the US are both victims of global terrorism. China, especially the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in Western China, has been plagued by terrorist threats for a long time. Memories and wounds of the 9/11 attacks are still lingering in Americans' minds. The world today is facing graver challenges posed by terrorism than ever before. The November 13 terrorist attacks in Paris, paired with Tuesday's attacks in Brussels, have sent a warning that the Islamic State (IS) is capable to plan and implement more attacks.

Worse, with the spread of terrorism, the possibility that they may get hold of nuclear materials cannot be excluded, as the International Atomic Energy Agency has warned. Earlier this month, Belgian police searched the home of a suspected IS member after the Paris attacks and found a surveillance recording of a senior researcher at a Belgian nuclear facility, giving rise to speculation that terrorists may be plotting to capture nuclear materials from the facility, perhaps by kidnapping the researcher.

Rather than await the next wake-up call, the international community, especially leading global powers such as the US and China, should unite and work together to crush terrorists with an iron fist and prevent the threat of nuclear terrorism. 

In fact, China and the US have carried out anti-terrorism cooperation for years. But due to divergences in ideology, values and how to define terrorist groups, the effectiveness of cooperation is not satisfying. Washington is applying double standards on terrorism, which has affected the extent of the cooperation.

In a few days, the fourth Nuclear Security Summit will convene in Washington, DC. Chinese President Xi Jinping will attend the meeting and meet his US counterpart Barack Obama on the sidelines. In the wake of the Brussels attacks and the risks of nuclear terrorism, China and the US should seize this opportunity to enhance mutual understanding and elevate their cooperation level in anti-terrorism. The global challenges facing us are unprecedented and complicated, and cannot be addressed without China-US cooperation.