By Doug Palmer
BEIJING - U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, addressing students at a top Chinese university on Friday, said the Obama administration was moving to ease restrictions on exports of high-technology goods to China.
Locke, a Chinese-American and former state governor who is well known in China, also brushed off the second suggestion this week that he run for president.
"No, no, no. I have no interest," Locke said during a question-and-answer session at Beijing's Tsinghua University, an elite school for training engineers and scientists.
Locke is leading a delegation of executives from 24 U.S. companies on a clean energy trade mission that began on Monday in Hong Kong.
At each stop in China, he has faced questions about U.S. restrictions on exporting sensitive technology to China, which Chinese officials say are partly to blame for their huge trade surplus with the United States.
The vigorous questions from the university audience underscored how much attention China gives the issue.
China is also likely to press the issue next week when it holds the Strategic and Economic Dialogue with senior U.S. officials, including Locke.
Locke told the students that the United States was moving to loosen controls on many commonly available high-tech goods, while boosting protections on the most sensitive technology with military applications.
Locke has criticised the current U.S. rules restricting high-tech exports as an artefact of the Cold War and called for their overhaul so that more countries can by American "dual use" equipment, which can have both military and civilian uses.
Locke is a former governor of Washington state, home to Microsoft, Boeing and other high-tech companies that have pushed for reforms of U.S. export controls.
But Locke also downplayed the effect that current controls have on bilateral trade.
"What a lot of people don't realize is most of the goods that are exported to China are not even subject to controls ... and only in a few cases are things not allowed to be exported" when licences are sought, Locke said.
That means China must "export less" and rely more on domestic demand, while the United States needs to reduce its huge debt and spend less on consumer goods, he said.
Locke has raised his own concerns about Chinese government procurement practices that frustrate many U.S. sales.
He urged Chinese decision-makers in meetings on Thursday not to automatically choose the lowest-cost provider for big wind energy and other projects since higher-priced U.S. equipment is often a better deal in the long run, a Commerce Department official said. (Editing by Nick Macfie)