The much-talked-about meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping held on the sidelines of the G20 summit here in Indonesia on Monday. Both the leaders shook hands, greeted each other and sat down at their tables, flanked by officials on each side. They smiled for cameras and Xi — through a translator — appeared to say, “Good to see you.”
China’s Xi and Biden have known each for more than a decade, but Monday saw them meet face-to-face for the first time in their current roles.
After the meeting, US President Joe Biden said that his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping is “willing to compromise on certain key issues.”
Biden while talking about increased Chinese aggressiveness in the backdrop of US House Speakers Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan said that he did not interpret any “imminent attempt” by China to invade self-governing Taiwan after meeting Xi for more than three hours.
“I do not think there is any imminent attempt by China to invade Taiwan. There need not be a new Cold War. Xi Jinping was direct and straightforward, he is willing to compromise on certain key issues,” said Biden.
Biden, taking questions from reporters, said that he does not believe there needs to be a Cold War with China and indicates he had a productive meeting with President Xi. “Do I think he’s willing to compromise on various issues? Yes,” said Biden.
“I had an open, candid conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping. We raised a lot of issues. The One China policy has not changed. I have asked Secretary Blinken to travel to China to keep lines of communication open between the two nations,” said Biden.
Biden reiterated that Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to China for follow-up meetings. US President Joe Biden said he plans to manage China and its leader Xi Jinping’s competition “responsibly” as he recapped their three-hour meeting.
He continued, “We’re going to compete vigorously, but I’m not looking for conflict. I’m going to manage his competition responsibly.” Biden said he told Xi that the US One China policy “has not changed” and the US “(opposes) unilateral change in the status quo by either side.” He said the US and China “should be able to work together where we can to solve global challenges that require every nation to do its part.”
Biden said in their talks, he made clear the US policy toward Taiwan had not changed, despite saying four times ahead of the talks the US would defend Taiwan militarily if China were to move on the self-governing island.
“I made it clear that we want to see cross-strait issues peacefully resolved, so it never has to come to that,” Biden said of any potential conflict over Taiwan. “I am convinced that he understood exactly what I was saying,” Biden said of the conversation on Taiwan.
Other topics included Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and a shared “belief in the threat for the use of nuclear weapons is totally unacceptable.” Biden says he isn’t certain whether China has the ability to influence North Korea’s decision-making when it comes to nuclear or missile tests. But he said he believes Chinese leader Xi Jinping does not want further escalatory action by Pyongyang and sought to underscore what further provocations from the North might mean for the US presence in the region. “I made it clear to President Xi Jinping that I thought they had an obligation to attempt to make it clear to North Korea that they should not engage in long range nuclear tests and I made it clear as well that if they did, they meant North Korea, that we would have to take certain actions that would be more defensive on our behalf and it would not be directed against…China,” Biden said at a news conference in Bali.
Meanwhile, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning on Monday expressed hope that the relations between both countries will return to the “right track of healthy and stable development”, CNN reported.
