US President Joe Biden and China’s President Xi Jinping spoke Thursday for the fifth time since Biden took office. In the more than two-hour phone call, the two heads of state outlined the future of the difficult relations between the two countries against the background of smoldering economic and geopolitical tensions.
The conversation began at 8:33 a.m. (US local time) and lasted until 10:50 a.m., the White House said. Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported that Xi and Biden had intensive exchanges on the relationship and matters of mutual interest.
The conversation comes at a time when the US President is trying to find new ways of working with the rising world power and at the same time is looking for strategies to curb the global influence of the People’s Republic. Differing views on global health, economic policy and human rights have long challenged US-Chinese relations. China’s refusal to condemn the Russian attack on Ukraine led to further strains.
Most recently, a possible visit by the Chair of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, to Taiwan had strained the intergovernmental relationship. China regards the self-governing and democratically governed island as part of its own territory. Beijing has said it would view such a trip as a provocation.
According to Chinese information, Xi also made Beijing’s claim to the island clear in the phone call. “Whoever plays with fire will die,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry said. It is to be hoped that this is clear to the USA.
Xi emphasized that it would be a mistake to define the mutual relationship in terms of strategic competition. Seeing China as the main rival and the most important long-term challenge would misinterpret China’s development and mislead the people of both countries as well as the international community, Xi underscored, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said.
The National Security Council’s communications director, John Kirby, said at a White House press conference on Wednesday that it was important for Xi and Biden to exchange information regularly. “The president wants to make sure the channels of conversation with President Xi stay open because they have to,” he said. “There are issues where we can work with China and there are issues where there is obviously friction and tension.”
The bilateral relationship between China and the United States has been among the most consequential in the world today, “with implications far beyond either country,” Kirby said. Biden and Xi last spoke in March, shortly after the February 24 Russian invasion of Ukraine.
As areas of tension that would be part of the conversation, Kirby cited Taiwan, “China’s aggressive behavior in the Indo-Pacific outside of Taiwan,” tensions in economic relations, and tensions over China’s response to the Russian war in Ukraine .
