Biden to meet China’s Xi on Monday
■ The former prime minister leads the Perikatan Nasional bloc, which has emerged as a third force in Malaysia.
■ Muhyiddin is winning crucial support from the majority Malays, and taking away some voters from Barisan, analysts say.
■ His coalition prioritises Malay interests and includes the Islamist party PAS, which has touted rolling out sharia or Islamic law.
■ He was a crucial player in the collapse of the Pakatan administration in 2020, leading a group of defectors to form another government at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
■ While Ismail is the official prime ministerial candidate for Barisan, there is intense speculation that Zahid — who leads the coalition – may try to go for the job if his alliance wins.
■ Zahid, a former deputy prime minister, has denied the rumours.
■ Zahid is more senior to Ismail in the coalition, which is plagued by infighting.
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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden will meet on Monday with President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of next week’s Group of 20 Summit in Bali, Indonesia, a face-to-face meeting that comes amid increasingly strained US-China relations, the White House announced Thursday.
It will be the first in-person meeting between the leaders of the world’s two biggest economies since Biden became president in January 2021 and comes weeks after Mr Xi was awarded a normbreaking third, five-year term as the Chinese Communist Party leader during the party’s national congress.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement the leaders will meet to “discuss efforts to maintain and deepen lines of communication between” the two countries and to “responsibly manage competition and work together where our interests align, especially on transnational challenges that affect the international community”.
The White House has been working with Chinese officials over the last several weeks to arrange the meeting. Mr Biden on Wednesday told reporters that he intended to discuss with Mr Xi growing tensions between Washington and Beijing over the self-ruled island of Taiwan, trade policies, Beijing’s relationship with Russia and more.
“What I want to do with him when we talk is lay out what each of our red lines are and understand what he believes to be in the critical national interests of China, what I know to be the critical interests of the United States,” Mr Biden said.
“And determine whether or not they conflict with one another.”
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