Biden, Xi agree to meet for talks amid high tension between US and China

Washington: US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping have agreed to meet on the sidelines of next month’s Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit in San Francisco, according to an American official familiar with the planning.

The two sides worked out an agreement in principle to hold a meeting during the summit as Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met Friday (local time) with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan, according to the official, who was not authorised to comment and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

China’s President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden last met on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali last year.Credit: AP

The official added the two sides had not worked out details on the exact day of the meeting, venue and other logistics.

The White House said in a statement after Friday’s meetings that the two sides were “working toward” a Biden-Xi face-to-face on the sidelines of APEC, a forum of 21 Pacific countries.

Earlier on Friday, Biden met Yi, holding an hour-long talk with the senior Chinese official in the Roosevelt Room at the White House. The meeting, with Blinken and Sullivan present, was the latest in a series of high-level contacts between the two countries as they explore the possibility of stabilising an increasingly tense relationship at a time of conflict in Ukraine and Israel.

The White House said Biden “emphasised that both the United States and China need to manage competition in the relationship responsibly and maintain open lines of communication”, and he “underscored that the United States and China must work together to address global challenges”.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets Chinese President Xi Jinping in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing in June.Credit: AP

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Biden viewed the Biden-Yi meeting as “a positive development, and a good opportunity to keep the conversation going”.

Biden had been widely expected to talk with Wang, a reciprocal action after Xi met Blinken in June.

Beijing has yet to confirm if Xi will travel to San Francisco for the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit next month.

Wang is on a three-day visit to Washington, where he’s been meeting top US officials. He sat down with Blinken on Friday morning for the second time during his trip.

On Thursday, after their initial meeting, the Chinese side said, “The two sides had an in-depth exchange of views on China-US relations and issues of common concern in a constructive atmosphere.”

In its readout, the US State Department said the two men addressed “areas of difference” and “areas of co-operation”, while Blinken “reiterated that the United States will continue to stand up for our interests and values and those of our allies and partners”.

Wang said before Thursday’s meeting that China’s goal was to “push the relationship as soon as possible back to the track of healthy, stable and sustainable development”.

US officials had said they would press Wang on the importance of China stepping up its role on the world stage if it wants to be considered a responsible major international player. The US has been disappointed with China over its support for Russia in the war against Ukraine and its relative silence on the war between Israel and Hamas.

“China should use whatever ability it has as an influential power to urge calm” in the Middle East, said State Department spokesman Matthew Miller. “We know China has relationships with a number of countries in the region, and we would urge them to use those relationships, the lines of communication they have, to urge calm and stability.”

US officials believe the Chinese have considerable leverage with Iran, which is a major backer of Hamas.

Wang came to Washington at a time when tensions between the two countries remain high, including over US export controls on advanced technology and China’s more assertive actions in the East and South China seas.

On Thursday, the US military released a video of a Chinese fighter jet flying within three metres of an American B-52 bomber over the South China Sea, nearly causing an accident. Earlier this month, the Pentagon released footage of some of the more than 180 intercepts of US warplanes by Chinese aircraft that occurred in the last two years, part of a trend US military officials call concerning.

Close encounter over the South China Sea.

The US also has renewed a warning that it would defend the Philippines in case of an armed attack under a security pact, after Chinese ships blocked and collided with two Philippine vessels off a contested shoal in the South China Sea.

Beijing has released its own video of close encounters in the region, including what it described as footage of the USS Ralph Johnson making a sharp turn and crossing in front of the bow of a Chinese navy ship. The US destroyer was captured sailing between two Chinese ships.

During his visit to Washington, Wang was also expected to discuss Taiwan, a self-governed island that Beijing considers to be part of Chinese territory. Beijing vows to seize it by force if necessary, but Washington, which has a security pact with Taiwan, opposes the use of force.

The Chinese president last came to the US in 2017, when then-president Donald Trump hosted him at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. Biden, who took office in 2021, has yet to host Xi on US soil. The two men last met in Bali in November 2022, on the sidelines of the Group of 20 meeting of leading rich and developing nations.

The US-China relationship began to sour in 2018 when the Trump administration slapped hefty tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese goods. It deteriorated further over a range of issues, including rights abuses, the South China Sea, Taiwan, technology and the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Biden-Xi meeting would bring much-needed stability to relations between the two countries, said Yun Sun, director of the China Program at the Washington-based think tank Stimson Centre.

“The keyword here is ‘stabilisation’ of bilateral ties – not really improvement, but stabilisation,” Sun said. “The world needs the US and China to take on a rational path and stabilise their relationship, offering the region and the world more certainty.”

AP

Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for our weekly What in the World newsletter.