State Councilor Yang Jiechi met with US Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Oct 8 in Beijing, pledging to strengthen bilateral ties after President Xi Jinping’s state visit last month.

Yang said Xi and Barack Obama further confirmed the direction in which the China-US relationship will develop, and that the two sides need to make joint efforts to implement their consensus.

Blinken said Xi’s state visit demonstrated that China and the United States “could cooperate in a very meaningful way.”

The United States is ready to work with China to implement the consensus reached during Xi’s visit to further bilateral relations, he added.

From Oct 5 to 10, Blinken is on an East Asia tour that has already taken him to Japan and the Republic of Korea.