Biden and Xi may meet in person

Leaders talk for two hours about China-us relationship

Those who play with fire will perish by it. It is hoped the US will be clear-eyed about [Taiwan]. China Foreign Affairs Ministry

President Joe Biden and China’s Xi Jinping are exploring meeting in person, a senior United States Administration official said after the leaders spent more than two hours yesterday talking through the future of their complicated relationship, with tension over Taiwan once again emerging as a flashpoint.

Biden conducted the telephone call from the Oval Office, where he was joined by top aides, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The official declined to be identified.

When Biden was Vice-president, he spent long hours with Xi in the US and China, an experience he often recalls as he talks about the two countries’ opportunities for conflict and co-operation. However, they have not met in person since Biden became President last year.

Xi has left mainland China only once, to visit Hong Kong, since the

Covid-19 pandemic began. But he’s been formally invited to Indonesia in November for the next G20 summit of the world’s leading economies, making the conference a potential location for a meeting with Biden.

The latest strain over Taiwan is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s potential visit to the island.

In the chat, Xi emphasised China’s claims to Taiwan, according to China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “Those who play with fire will perish by it,” the ministry said. “It is hoped the US will be clear-eyed about this.”

The White House said Biden stressed US policy has not changed and that the US “strongly opposes unilateral efforts to change the status quo or undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.”

The goal of the call was to “responsibly manage our differences and work together where our interests align,” the White House said. As usual, China left no doubt that it blames the US for the deteriorating relationship between the two countries.

“President Xi underscored that to approach and define China-us relations in terms of strategic competition and view China as the primary rival and the most serious longterm challenge would be misperceiving China-us relations and misreading China’s development, and would mislead the people of the two countries and the international community,” China’s report said.

While Beijing’s warning about playing with fire over Taiwan generated attention yesterday, it didn’t represent an escalation of Xi’s usual diplomatic rhetoric, US analysts said.

Yun Sun, director of the China programme at the Stimson Centre think tank, noted that both countries said the conversation covered a wide range of topics, from the pandemic to climate change. She said it was “more positive than the two leaders informing each other, well, we’re going to stick to our positions on Taiwan.”

She also suggested Xi may have an incentive to tamp down tensions as he seeks a third term as President.

The call with Xi took place as Biden aims to find new ways to work with China and contain its influence around the world. Differing perspectives on global health, economic policy and human rights have long tested the ties — with China’s refusal to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine adding further strain.

Pelosi’s potential visit to Taiwan has created another pressure point. Beijing has said it would view such a trip as a provocation, a threat US officials are taking with heightened seriousness in light of Russia’s incursion into Ukraine.

Pelosi would be the highestranking US elected official to travel to Taiwan since Republican Newt Gingrich visited in 1997 when he was House speaker. Biden last week said US military officials believed it was “not a good idea” for Pelosi to visit the island at the moment.

John Kirby, a US national security spokesman, said it was important for Biden and Xi to regularly touch base.

“The president wants to make sure that the lines of communication with President Xi remain open.”

Biden and Xi last spoke in March, soon after Russian invaded Ukraine.

“This is one of the most consequential bilateral relationships in the world today,” Kirby said.

Biden has moved to shift US reliance off Chinese manufacturing, including legislation to encourage semiconductor firms to build more high-tech plants in the US.

He also wants to marshal global democracies to back infrastructure investments in low- and middleincome nations as an alternative to China’s “Belt and Road Initiative”.

Biden has kept in place Trump-era tariffs on many Chinese-made goods but is weighing whether to ease some in light of soaring inflation.

US officials have also criticised China’s “zero-covid” policy.

Other points of strain include China’s treatment of Uyghur Muslims, its militarisation in the South China Sea and its global campaign of economic and political espionage. AP