Content about Washington

No country should be allowed to damage world peace or throw a region into chaos for selfish gains, President Xi Jinping said on Sunday.

The remark shows China's determination to maintain regional peace as tensions in northeastern Asia run high, analysts said.

"Countries - big or small, strong or weak, rich or poor - should all contribute their share in maintaining and enhancing peace," Xi said at the Boao Forum for Asia Annual Conference 2013, which attracted more than 2,500 political and economic leaders from around the globe.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has urged the European Union to maintain its embargo on arms exports to China because of the heightened tensions in the East China Sea. But it is Japan that is guilty of escalating regional tensions. It is busy playing up a “China threat” to mislead international opinion, so that it can achieve its long-standing military ambitions.

Legislators in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea gathered on Monday for an annual spring parliamentary session that followed a ruling party declaration that nuclear bomb building and a stronger economy are the nation's top priorities.

The meeting of the Supreme People's Assembly follows near-daily threats from Pyongyang, including vows of nuclear strikes on Seoul and Washington.

Grappling with a spike in violence and a worsening political situation, Iraq on Wednesday marked 10 years since a US-led invasion that sought to establish a stable, democratic ally in the Middle East.

The event was met with little fanfare in Baghdad, falling a day after a wave of bombings and gun attacks killed 65 people in the Iraqi capital as some ministers began a cabinet boycott and officials delayed provincial polls.

President Xi Jinping told US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew in Beijing on Tuesday that he wants to build a new type of relationship with Washington centered on core interests.

It was Xi's first major international meeting since taking office on Thursday. It was also the first high-level Sino-US contact since former US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta visited Beijing in September.

Xi's emphasis on "core interests" clarified the bottom line regarding Beijing's ties with Washington in a polite yet firm way, analysts said.

On March 20, 2003, former US president George W. Bush joined hands with Tony Blair, then British prime minister, to invade Iraq without declaring a war, saying that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and was harboring al-Qaida.

Amid tensions on the Korean Peninsula, US Deputy Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter began a five-day trip to Asia on Sunday, kicking off a series of high-ranking US officials' visits to countries in the region including China.

Observers said the visits show that Asia is still the major focus of US foreign policy, and frequent exchanges between Chinese and US officials will further promote Sino-US ties.

The Pentagon is seeking support from mass media and public opinion to avoid a budget cut in US cyberforces, and resorting to cyberthreats as a "cover" to actually boost investment in the sector, experts said in Beijng.

US President Barack Obama said on Wednesday that Washington will engage in more "tough talk" with other countries, including China, about alleged cyberthreats.

A top International Monetary Fund official warned on Tuesday of the need for China to follow through on plans to shift its economy from an investment-driven model to one that relies on domestic consumption.

Zhu Min, one of the IMF's three deputy managing directors, said the key to this transition is economic reform and the quality, rather than the rate, of growth.

WASHINGTON - David Johnson, director of the Global Owl Project, is working with researchers in 65 countries to compile a vast database and celebration of the world's owls, with descriptions, natural history, genetics, vocalizations, population estimates, owl myths and legends.

On Tuesday, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea threatened to nullify the Armistice Agreement inked in 1953, an apparent move to exert pressure on the United Nations Security Council while the latter was busy discussing new sanctions against Pyongyang.

But the DPRK's threat is not meant to "resume" the war. On the contrary, observers in Beijing feel it is a desperate effort to bring the United States back to the negotiation table.

In a speech titled "Japan is back", during his visit to Washington, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pledged to reinvigorate Japan's economy and said: "Japan is not, and will never be, a tier-two country."

Abe's economic revival recipe has received mixed response. But one thing is for sure that economic strength alone does not make a first-tier country.