Gregoire hails positives, protests during Hu’s visit

Chinese President Hu Jintao’s visit to Washington state went off without a hitch, and even the protesters were able to present their messages while being “culturally sensitive,” Gov. Chris Gregoire said Friday.

Hu finalized deals to buy 80 jetliners from Boeing and more than $1 billion in software from Microsoft during this week’s visit, Gregoire said during an interview with The Spokesman-Review editorial board. He also agreed to talks on a global health conference and “was positive” about the Chinese government opening a trade office in Washington state.

“Washington has two trade offices there,” Gregoire said. Unlike the rest of the nation, which has a trade deficit with China, the state has a trade surplus, she added.

The Chinese are interested in using more American building methods in their booming construction, and Hu was interested in educational exchanges that include that type of training, as well as sending their students to Washington for cultural exchanges.

“People are working on whether we can make that happen,” Gregoire said.

Hu went from Washington state to Washington, D.C., for meetings with President Bush. On Thursday, during a joint appearance, a demonstrator posing as a journalist shouted to Bush to stop the killing of those connected with Falun Gong.

Gregoire said the route that Hu traveled for meetings around the Seattle area had people with banners that supported and opposed the communist government’s policies. But she described the protesters as “culturally sensitive.”

“They got their message across in a way that showed him there’s not a whole lot wrong with freedom of speech,” she said.

Gregoire was in Spokane for a meeting of representatives from four states and 13 Indian tribes on the salmon and the Columbia River system. She said the goal was to work out a system to satisfy U.S. District Judge James Redden, who is ordering the federal government to spill extra water over the hydroelectric dams this spring and summer, to help young salmon and steelhead migrate to the ocean.

“We don’t need a federal court to come in and tell us how to solve our problems,” Gregoire said.