China's Premier sought to ease tensions with the U.S. ahead of a speech on Thursday in which he is expected to defend Asian giant's Yuan policy, as U.S. lawmakers prepared to vote on punishing Beijing for alleged currency manipulation.
Prime Minister Wen Jiabao is expected to rule out drastic appreciation of the yuan in his address.
But ahead of his speech and a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama at the United Nations General Assembly, he stressed that the world's two largest economies had more common interests than they had differences.
U.S. lawmakers meanwhile prepared to vote on whether to punish China for allegedly manipulating its currency and distorting trade.
“There is no basis for a drastic appreciation of the renminbi [yuan],” said Mr. Wen late on Wednesday in a speech to the U.S.-China Business Committee in New York.
“If the renminbi appreciates by 20 to 40 per cent according to the requests of the U.S. government, we do not know how many Chinese companies will go bankrupt and how many Chinese workers will be laid off and how many rural workers will go back to their homes and there will be major turbulence in the Chinese society,” he said, according to a translation of his speech. He said China had “kept the renminbi exchange rate basically stable at an adaptive level since the outbreak of the financial crisis.”
