This year's S&ED comes at a critical time, as the Washington Post noted that "the US-China relationship is facing its stiffest test since then US president Richard Nixon traveled to Mao Zedong's China in 1972."

 Washington has sided with Tokyo, which is locked in a territorial dispute with Beijing in the East China Sea, by sending fighter jets to an Air Defense Identification Zone set up by China and voicing explicit support for Japan during Obama's East Asia visit.

 In May, the US indictment of five Chinese military officers over so-called cyber espionage further irked China, which halted a China-US cyber security working group due to meet under the framework of the S&ED.

 Before the S&ED formally starts, the two sides have already traded blame.

 China's Assistant Foreign Minister Zheng Zeguang told a press briefing that the US "has made some wrong remarks and acts on maritime issues and cyber issues, bringing negative impact on bilateral relations."

Time to avoid downward spiral of US-China ties: US expert

It is important to have a greater degree of confidence in understanding what the other is doing, at least a little more agreement in terms of what is occurring, and then to discuss why it is occurring and see whether we can reduce the characters that exist in each other's motivation.

Removing investment barriers a win-win step for China, US

To live up to its name as the most open market in the world, the United States should take immediate actions to improve its national security review system. For starters, it needs to give a clear definition of "national security" and make the process of the review more transparent to the public.

US needs to bring sincerity to cyber security talks with China

Still, cyber security is rather a multilateral issue than a bilateral one. The scale of cyber theft is so large to the extent that it hurts national interests of many countries where the Internet has become an important infrastructure playing a significant role in such fields as economy, social development and national defense.

Candid dialogue aims at easing anxiety

There will be continuing pessimistic comments from the public in both countries. It is vital that both governments remain determined. It will be a significant political achievement if the two develop a relationship that is different from the one under the Yalta system during the last century.

China's currency policy no political tool for US

No matter how committed Beijing is to currency reforms, this formidable mission can't be completed overnight. China will not bow to external pressures, but has to stick to its own steady pace in allowing a more flexible renminbi, or the yuan.

Meanwhile, playing up China's currency issue has become a favored political tactic for US politicians in order to gather more votes and deflect attention from domestic woes.