Biden, Xi cool Cold War rhetoric

PRESIDENTS Joe Biden and Xi Jinping tried to take some heat out of their simmering superpower rivalry Monday, during a three-hour summit that found common ground on Ukraine but left little doubt that stark differences remain.

Biden emerged from the meeting proclaiming there need not be a new Cold War, as both leaders spoke of the desire to prevent high tensions from spilling over into conflict.

Xi told Biden that the two countries ‘share more, not less, common interests', according to a Chinese account of the meeting, sounding more conciliatory than the last three pandemic-filled years without faceto-face presidential meetings would suggest.

‘The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle the relationship,' Xi told him.

Trying to scotch the notion that China is bent on usurping the United States and remaking the world in its own authoritarian image, Xi reportedly said Beijing does not seek to challenge the United States or ‘change the existing international order‘.