U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter met a top Chinese general on Thursday and repeated a U.S. call for a halt to land reclamation in the South China Sea, while stressing that the Pentagon remained committed to expanding military contacts with China.
Hackers broke into U.S. government computers, possibly compromising the personal data of 4 million current and former federal employees, and investigators were probing whether the culprits were based in China, U.S. officials said on Thursday.
Western and Arab states carrying out air strikes on Islamic State fighters backed on Tuesday Iraq's plan to retake territory from the jihadist movement after being accused by the Iraqi premier of not doing enough to help Baghdad push back the insurgents.
The United States said on Friday that China had placed mobile artillery weapons systems on a reclaimed island in the disputed South China Sea, a development that Republican Sen. John McCain called "disturbing and escalatory."
