biden xi: Biden and Xi meet face-to-face as superpower relations mired in tensions

U.S. President Joe Biden will meet Chinese language chief Xi Jinping in individual on Monday for the primary time since taking workplace, with U.S. considerations over Taiwan, Russia’s battle in Ukraine and North Korea’s nuclear ambitions on prime of his agenda.

The long-awaited in-person assembly comes as relations between the superpowers have sunk to their lowest in a long time. The 2 will meet on the Indonesian island of Bali forward of the annual Group of 20 (G20) summit gathering leaders of the world’s main developed and rising economies.

Biden goes into the assembly on the again of a significant home victory with Democrats clinching management of the Senate, a improvement acknowledged by international leaders, whereas Xi secured an unprecedented third time period in workplace final month.

“I do know I am coming in stronger however I do not want that. I do know Xi Jinping, I spent extra time with him than some other world chief.” Biden advised reporters in Cambodia on Sunday after the Senate outcomes. “There’s by no means any miscalculation about … the place every of us stands.”

The U.S. president, who’s on a whirlwind journey with stops at a global local weather summit in Egypt and an ASEAN assembly and the East Asia Summit in Cambodia forward of G20, is hoping to construct a “ground for the connection” with China and guarantee there are guidelines that sure competitors between the 2 nations.

Biden not too long ago stated he was unwilling to make any elementary concessions when he meets Xi, and that he needed each leaders to put out their “pink strains” and resolve areas of battle.

The assembly is unlikely to provide concrete outcomes and no joint assertion is predicted, the White Home has stated, however it might assist stabilize ties marked by rising tensions over points from Hong Kong and Taiwan to the South China Sea, coercive commerce practices and U.S. restrictions on Chinese language know-how.

Biden and Xi, who’ve held 5 cellphone or video calls since Biden took workplace in January 2021, final met in individual through the Obama administration. Strains flared particularly after U.S. Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s August journey to Taiwan, the self-governed democratic island that Beijing claims as its territory.

White Home nationwide safety adviser Jake Sullivan stated the assembly might run for 2 hours or extra, and Biden can be “completely simple and direct” within the dialog.

“The president sees the USA and China as being engaged in a stiff competitors, however that competitors mustn’t tip over into battle or confrontation,” Sullivan advised reporters, promising Biden feedback afterwards. He stated Biden would additionally search for areas the place the USA and China might work collectively, together with local weather change or public well being.

RELATIONS DATE OVER A DECADE

The 2 leaders know one another properly, having travelled over 17,000 miles collectively and spent 78 hours in conferences, in response to Biden’s calculations. They hung out collectively in the USA and China in 2011 and 2012 when each had been serving as their respective international locations’ vice presidents.

Beijing, annoyed by what it sees because the Biden administration’s weaponisation of financial insurance policies, has sought to broaden ties with Europe and Africa. Xi’s authorities has additionally criticized the Biden administration’s posture towards Taiwan as undermining China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

The Chinese language president has additionally urged that Washington needs to stifle Beijing’s rising affect because it tries to overhaul the USA because the world’s largest economic system.

Monday’s assembly on the sidelines of a gathering of Group of 20 leaders in Bali, Indonesia, comes weeks after the Biden administration unveiled a brand new nationwide safety technique that sees an more and more authoritarian China as probably the most consequential problem to the worldwide order.

“The Biden administration will attempt to kill two birds with one stone – enlist Chinese language help on points like reining in North Korea and local weather change – to create some foundation for cooperation between China and the U.S.,” stated Oriana Skylar Mastro, a China knowledgeable at Stanford College.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose, David Brunnstrom, Simon Lewis, writing by Andrea Shalal and Nandita Bose; Enhancing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Lisa Shumaker)