The much-awaited meeting between Joe Biden and Xi Jinping achieved its admittedly low expectations when the two finally met and showed a willingness to move the bilateral relationship in a positive direction. Progress began to show soon after the meeting, for example on journalist visas. But the two sides also provided a list of existing grievances following the three-and-a-half-hour talks. The US said it raised its concerns over China’s human rights record, its “unfair trade and economic practices”, and its behaviour in the South China Sea. On the issue of…
Tag: Joe Biden
Biden-Xi virtual summit: Biden says US and China must ‘not veer into conflict’ – video
US president Joe Biden has told Chinese leader Xi Jinping that he hoped to have a candid conversation about human rights and security issues as the two began a meeting meant to lower tensions between the two global superpowers. Biden added that the two leaders must make sure their relations do not veer into open conflict, including by installing ‘common sense’ guardrails. Biden spoke with Xi over a video conference as the two leaders engaged in their most extensive talks since Biden became president in January. Xi said the two sides must increase communication and…
Biden and Xi prepare for virtual summit amid rising tensions
Joe Biden and Xi Jinping will hold a virtual summit on Monday intended to stop, or at least slow down, the downward spiral in US-Chinese relations. The two leaders have talked twice by phone since Biden took office in January, but this video conference will be their most substantial discussion so far. It comes days after the two countries surprised analysts by agreed to boost climate cooperation in Glasgow. But it also comes at a time of increasing friction over Taiwan – the most dangerous potential flashpoint between the two…
Scott Morrison tells Cop26 Australia will exceed 2030 target in bid to fend off criticism
Scott Morrison has used his national statement at the Cop26 to emphasise that Australia will probably overachieve on its 2030 emissions reduction target in an effort to blunt international criticism about his government’s lack of climate ambition. While the lead-up to the Glasgow summit was dominated by Morrison’s negotiations with the National party to land a net zero commitment by 2050, the UN-led event is focused on ambition for the 2030s. Australia – part of a bloc of big emitters and exporters at last weekend’s G20 summit in Rome attempting…
Chinese leader Xi Jinping to attend Cop26 by video link
China’s president, Xi Jinping, will appear at the Cop26 UN climate summit in Glasgow next week via video link, the country’s foreign ministry has said, after weeks of speculation over what role Xi might play in the meeting, which opens on Sunday. Xi has not left China since last year, when his country was first engulfed in the deadly Covid outbreak. The foreign ministry said on Friday that Xi would take part in this weekend’s G20 leaders’ summit in Rome via video link as well. Beijing published its long-awaited national…
China warns against ‘wrong signals’ as Biden suggests US would defend Taiwan
China has urged the US to “avoid sending any wrong signals” after President Joe Biden for a second time in three months said the US would come to Taiwan’s defence if it was attacked. In both instances, the White House has clarified that there has been no change in US policy, which officially maintains so-called “strategic ambiguity” regarding Taiwan. Still, Biden’s words will rattle Beijing. China’s foreign ministry has “no room for concessions” when it comes to its core interests, its spokesperson Wang Wenbin told a daily news briefing, in…
Coal-state Democrat set to scupper Biden clean energy plans
President Joe Biden is likely to abandon a clean energy programme that was the centrepiece of his efforts to tackle greenhouse gas emissions at home, US media reported, because of opposition from a swing-vote Democratic senator from a state with a historically large coal industry. Funding to replace coal- and gas-fired plants with wind, solar and nuclear generation was part of a massive budget bill that Biden is struggling to get through Congress. The New York Times reported that White House staff members are now rewriting the legislation without the…
Biden, China’s Xi expected to meet virtually by year’s end
ZURICH (AP) — With tensions rising between the global powers, President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping are expected to hold a virtual meeting before year’s end, according to the White House. The agreement in principle for the talks was disclosed after White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan and senior Chinese foreign policy adviser Yang Jiechi met for six hours in Zurich. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the two sides are still working through what the virtual meeting “would look like.” The presidential meeting was proposed…
Republicans Say Kerry Is Lobbying Against Slave Labor Bill
X Story Stream recent articles President Biden, with the full support of the Democratic Party, has committed this country to defending human rights around the world and addressing climate change. Although these are not competing goals, they are not necessarily reinforcing. Last week, John Kerry announced plans to visit China to continue carbon emissions negotiations, a task fitting the Biden administration’s designated envoy on climate change. But some Republican lawmakers are demanding to know if Kerry has been quietly lobbying against anti-slave labor legislation in Washington to secure diplomatic breathing…
America will never be back like before, but the world still needs democratic leadership | Timothy Garton Ash
“America is back,” said President Joe Biden earlier this year, and the entire democratic world breathed a sigh of relief. But as we watch the debacle of the United States’ withdrawal from Afghanistan – Kabul as Saigon 2 – a ghostly voice whispers to us: what if America is not back? What if it is never coming back? What happens then? The Chinese century? Europe as new leader of the free world? Or just plain old international anarchy? If only this were like Saigon in 1975. The US humiliation in…