WASHINGTON - Tensions on the Korean Peninsula and disputes in the South China Sea between Beijing and its smaller neighbors will be key topics for U.S. President Barack Obama's talks Saturday with Chinese President Xi Jinping, a senior White House official said Monday.

Obama also plans to take up such issues as climate change, cybersecurity, China's human rights record and bilateral economic issues during talks on the sidelines of a two-day Group of 20 summit starting Sunday in Hangzhou, eastern China, Ben Rhodes, deputy national security adviser for strategic communications, said at a press briefing.

Obama, who will leave office in January after completing two four-year terms, "will have both an extensive bilateral meeting and be hosted for a small dinner by President Xi Jinping," Rhodes said.

"I think we will be reviewing all of the issues that have been front and center in the U.S.-China relationship for the last seven and a half years," he said.

The talks come as the two powers are at odds over the South China Sea issue and Washington's planned deployment of an advanced antimissile defense system in South Korea, a move Beijing opposes despite U.S. assurance that it is solely defensive and meant to counter North Korea's missile and nuclear weapons development.

North Korea has raised regional tensions by conducting a series of test-firings of submarine-launched and other ballistic missiles in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions banning the country from conducting any launch using ballistic missile technology.

Rhodes did not say whether the defense system, called the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, will be discussed. But noting China's opposition to the planned deployment of the system in South Korea, he said, "Our point to China has been this in no way is directed at China. It's directed at the threat from North Korea."

"And so long as North Korea is developing ballistic missile capabilities and moving forward with its nuclear program, we have an obligation, a responsibility, for our own security and the security of our allies in Japan and the Republic of Korea to take steps to counter that threat," Rhodes said, referring to South Korea by its formal name.

The White House official stressed the importance of the United States, China and other members of the international community to "continue to apply pressure on the North Koreans to change course."

Aside from Xi, Obama may have informal talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Ukraine and Syria on the fringes of the G-20 summit before traveling to Laos to attend the East Asia Summit and other high-level meetings involving the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, according to Rhodes.

China's island construction and militarization of outposts in the South China Sea are likely to be a major issue at ASEAN-related summits in Vientiane, especially as Beijing refuses to comply with an international tribunal ruling that dismissed its unilateral claims in most of the sea.

During his visit to Laos, the first by a U.S. president, Obama will give a speech on the U.S. strategic rebalance to Asia, a policy pursued by the Obama administration to counter the rise of China, Rhodes said.

"I think you will hear the president give a forceful case for TPP and why it is essential to American economic and security interests for Congress to move forward with TPP," he said, referring to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a yet-to-be-ratified free trade deal involving 12 Pacific-rim economies including the United States and Japan.

"TPP is in many ways seen as a litmus test for whether or not the U.S. has staying power in the region," Rhodes said. "What the countries of the Asia-Pacific region want to know...is whether or not we can be counted on."

But the TPP's fate has become uncertain as both Democratic and Republican presidential nominees, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and business mogul Donald Trump, have voiced opposition to it.

== Kyodo