Biden promotes high-level meetings with Beijing officials

Biden promotes high-level meetings with Beijing officials

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Five months after taking a tough stance, President Joe Biden will initiate his next phase of his China policy and promote high-level meetings with Beijing officials.

According to three people familiar with the talks, the United States and China are discussing a possible meeting between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the G20 meeting in Italy next week.

The Biden administration also told Beijing that it hopes to send Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman to visit China in the summer.

The White House is also considering a phone call with Xi Jinping. This will be Biden’s second contact with his Chinese counterpart as the President of the United States.

In the first few months of his presidency, Biden emphasized that he would take a patient attitude toward China while focusing on strengthening the United States and consolidating the alliance.

After Washington has made significant progress in responding to the Covid-19 pandemic and months of negotiations with its allies, it has decided to significantly increase its engagement with China Strong joint statement on China’s actions At the summit, including G7.

The White House also held preliminary internal discussions on sending Blincoln or National Security Adviser Jack Sullivan to China later this year, which may lay the foundation for Biden and Xi Jinping to hold a bilateral summit during the G20 summit in Rome. In October.

“The government planned from the beginning to rank its policies as [first] Bonnie Glaser, a China expert at the German Marshall Fund, said: “Focus on revitalizing the United States, controlling the pandemic, and reviving our alliances and partnerships.”

“Now they think it’s time to turn to contact, even though they might not call it that, and start a dialogue with China.”

This move will arouse criticism from the hawks, who have praised Biden for unexpectedly taking Be tough on BeijingBut it will be welcomed by the business community, which has been worried about the deterioration of relations.

The Blinken-Wang meeting will mark the first high-level contact since Blinken and Sullivan met their colleagues in Alaska in March. A U.S. official said that this would be an opportunity to continue discussing Anchorage’s closed-door discussions after the fierce publicity began.

At the end of that meeting, Brinken made it clear to Yang Jiechi, China’s top foreign policy official, that he was not going to go to China for follow-up discussions despite the invitation.

It is not clear whether Beijing will agree to these meetings. The US official said that China did not say whether it will receive Sherman. Sherman will be the only senior Biden official to visit other than climate negotiator John Kerry. He met with Biden’s colleagues in Shanghai in April. .

Emphasizing the challenges facing the relations between the two countries, China continues to Ignore the Pentagon’s request Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin talks with General Xu Qiliang, China’s top military officer. The Financial Times reported last month that China had rejected three phone calls. A US defense official said that the situation has not changed.

The White House and the State Department did not comment on the negotiation of diplomatic contacts. But Sullivan said last week that Biden will talk to Xi Jinping soon after the summit between the US president and Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Geneva.

Sullivan said that Biden is committed to talking with Xi Jinping to “assess” this relationship. “We are very committed to this. It is only a matter of time and method,” he said.

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