The Chinese Pavilion at the Nuclear Summit Expo in Washington highlights the newly established Center of Excellence on Nuclear Security (COE) in Beijing, which is an expression of China's strong commitment to the new type of major power strategic relationship between China and the US. "The COE," said Xu, "to a large extent is the outcome of our collaborations with the US."

"The Center of Excellence really is excellent," Moniz said, after visiting the exhibition.

"I was there in China for the groundbreaking in 2013," Moniz said. "It was an empty field, and to go back just over two years later and to see this magnificent structure is really impressive."

Opened on March 18 in an industrial park in northeast Beijing, the COE has lab space, testing sites and facilities for nuclear power workers to practice response techniques.

China provided 65 percent and the US 35 percent of the funding to establish the COE. Both countries have provided the cutting edge equipment and training facilities.

"The US has provided first-class equipment to the center, such as the mass spectrometer," Xu said. "China has also provided some equipment that was independently researched and developed in China. China and the US have long carried out collaborations on research into the technologies of nuclear security."

Five US laboratories are involved in the COE, according to Moniz.

"There's a lot of technology development that we can still do for detection, for forensics. So I think this is going to be a terrific ongoing partnership," Moniz said.

"Now that we have the facility, China will be training Chinese and other experts, and we will continue, especially through our national laboratories, to work on the training, on the technology," Moniz continued.

"We will work together to develop new approaches to training and security, so it's just going to be a terrific collaboration and building on what we've done before."

Xu mentioned that President Xi Jinping has attached a great deal of importance to reducing the use of high-energy uranium.

"The COE will serve the Asia Pacific region and can conduct training for all the countries of the world that have the need," Xu said.

"We certainly support this center becoming a regional resource. So we see China as playing that very important role. And we completely support that, and we will help in any way we can," Moniz said. "We still need more COEs around the world, also. So it's a good model," he added.

Allan Fong in Washington contributed to this story.

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