Biden and China’s Xi discuss communication at APEC summit

WASHINGTON:

The White House said on Monday that President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping will discuss strengthening communication and managing competition when they meet on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit this week.

The face-to-face meeting in the San Francisco Bay Area on Wednesday will be the first between Biden and Xi in a year, with high-stakes diplomacy aimed at reducing tensions between the two superpowers.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that Biden believes there is no substitute for face-to-face diplomacy in managing the complex relationship.

“We expect the leaders to discuss some of the most fundamental elements of the U.S.-DPRK bilateral relationship, including the continued importance of strengthening open lines of communication and responsibly managing competition so that it does not veer into conflict,” Sullivan said, referring to to the People’s Republic of China.

“The way we achieve this is through vigorous diplomacy. That’s how we clear up misconceptions and avoid surprises.”

Sullivan said Biden will attend the summit “on a solid footing,” having positioned the United States to be able to compete effectively at home and abroad and with “the strongest recovery and lowest inflation of any leading economy.” .

He said Washington was looking for concrete results from the meeting and hoped to see progress in restoring military-to-military ties with China and combating the fentanyl trade that has become a scourge in the United States.

China severed military communications with the United States last year after a visit to Taiwan, a democratically-ruled island that China claims as its own, by then US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Strained relations further worsened when the US shot down an American spy balloon in February.

Sullivan said that communication between the troops was the way to ensure that competition did not turn into conflict, and that China had been “constructive” on the issue in the dialogue leading up to the summit.

“We’ll see what happens in San Francisco and the President will be able to report after the meeting if in fact we’ve made progress in restoring military-to-military ties,” he said.

Biden and Xi have known each other for more than a decade and have shared hours of conversation over six interactions since Biden’s 2021 inauguration.

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But they have met only once since then, and Xi has not visited the United States since 2017. Analysts and officials say they will come to the table in an atmosphere of mutual suspicion and confused impressions of what the other is up to.

The meeting is also expected to cover global issues from the Israel-Hamas war to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, North Korea’s ties with Russia, Taiwan, human rights, artificial intelligence, as well as “fair” trade and economic relations, top officials of the Biden administration said.

Sullivan said Biden would bolster stability across the Middle East, adding that Beijing should share an interest in de-escalation there.

Biden would argue that Iran acting in an “escalating, destabilizing manner” is not in China’s interest, he said. “And the DPRK, of course, has a relationship with Iran and is capable, if it chooses, of addressing these points directly to the Iranian government.”

Leaders from the 21-member APEC forum are due to gather in San Francisco from Wednesday to Friday, and the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine have divided opinion among them.

The top US official on APEC, Matt Murray, told reporters on Monday that the US-DPRK is working hard to try to get a strong consensus from the leaders, but analysts say divisions are making it difficult to put together such a plan.

Sullivan said that at APEC, Biden will present his economic vision for the region and talk about “how the United States is the preeminent driver of inclusive, sustainable economic growth in the Asia-Pacific.”