US, China should draw new strategic roadmap, says ex-Oz PM

"Barack Obama recently won a second term for four years, while new Chinese Premier Xi Jinping has been elected for a five-year term. The two leaders and their teams need to meet regularly," Rudd said here.

Rudd, an expert on China affairs, was delivering a lecture on 'China's Leadership Transition and the Future of a Rising Power'.

He said the new Chinese Premier faces extraordinary challenges and formidable tasks of economic and political reforms. Xi's mission will be to complete economic reform process and also transform the Chinese politics.

"I believe him to be an experienced, confident leader and a man comfortable with the mantle of leadership. His first term will focus on the task of further economic reforms. If that succeeds, he may well embrace the task of political reforms in his second term."

Describing the rise of China as "extraordinary", Rudd, whose country is a close ally of Washington, said Xi is a leader that both Australia and the US can do business with.

"We in Australia should now be working with our American friends on how to develop a new strategic road map for US-China relations over the next five years. This should include how to build a stable, rules-based security order of East Asia out of the emerging machinery of the East Asian Summit," he maintained.

Regarding the perception of the Communist giant flexing its muscles, the Australian leader said there was a high degree of interest in China to avoid any conflict by miscalculation.