●Hill leaders raise human rights with Chinese leader_自考|成考|专升本|高升专|高升本|在职研究生-学历教育网

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Washington (CNN) -- Top Democratic and Republican congressional leaders met with Chinese President Hu Jintao on Thursday, using the occasion to raise strong concerns about Beijing's commitment to human rights and economic issues such as the protection of intellectual property.专科

Hu met with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, among others. Neither man attended Wednesday night's White House state dinner in honor of the Chinese leader.

Earlier in the week, Reid called Hu a "dictator" -- words that were later recanted by his spokesman.

Boehner noted that the concerns relating to tensions on the Korean peninsula also were raised during Thursday's talks.

Chinese take on Hu's U.S. visit

China to become world's top power?

China on course to outpace U.S.

Hu Jintao's 'critical' visit to America

We had "a good meeting," Boehner said. "I would hope that the dialogue on all of these subjects would continue."

Disagreements over human rights -- including China's treatment of imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo -- were "raised very strongly," according to Rep. Howard Berman of California, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

"I would not indicate there was great engagement ... other than a general recognition by the president of China that they have a ways to go," Berman told reporters.

On Wednesday, Hu met with President Barack Obama behind closed doors at the White House for several hours as top officials from both countries worked to address a range of issues tied to the global economic crisis, international security, the environment and human rights.

Obama administration officials used the president's meeting with Hu to highlight economic progress between the two countries, announcing Beijing's approval of $45 billion in new contracts for U.S. companies to export goods to China. The contracts will support an estimated 235,000 American jobs, according to the White House.

The two leaders acknowledged continuing differences on human rights, but they pledged to keep working on such issues in a "frank and candid way," according to Obama.

Human rights is always a touchy subject in China, as censors in China have made clear during Hu's visit. The censors blacked out CNN's news broadcast each time human rights was mentioned. Even when Hu spoke about human rights, it was blacked out.

Censors also blacked the network out in China whenever a CNN report mentioned or showed video of Liu.

Footage of anti-China protesters near the White House was similarly blacked out.

Hu, who started his three-day trip to the United States on Tuesday afternoon, was treated to a military honor guard and review at the White House -- part of the traditional pomp and circumstance reserved for visiting leaders of major powers.

Obama hailed Hu's visit as a chance to lay a foundation for the next 30 years of Sino-American relations.