Xi-Biden summit important to help US and China avoid ‘unintended conflict’, White House official says

Meeting can help clarify ‘understanding of one another’s intentions’, according to the US official
The two leaders’ first virtual meeting, expected to last several hours, could help gauge the prospects for their countries’ troubled relations

US-China relations

Jodi Xu Klein

Published: 6:00pm, 15 Nov 2021

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Taiwan is expected to feature in the meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on Tuesday morning Beijing time (Monday night in Washington) as the pair discuss their countries’ many points of disagreement.

“This leader-level meeting is important to manage the competition” between the two countries and avoid “an unintended conflict”, a senior administration official said on Sunday at a briefing on the summit.

She said the two presidents’ first face-to-face interaction – albeit virtual – since Biden took office 10 months ago was expected to last several hours. It will be their most substantial discussion so far, after speaking by telephone on two occasions.

Biden initiated the meeting to allow dialogue “in a number of areas where we both need to have a clear understanding of one another’s intentions”, the official said. “We need to not only keep channels of communication open, but to build those common-sense guardrails to avoid miscalculation and misunderstanding.”

The summit will be scrutinised for signs of movement in US-China relations. Hostility between the sides has not only outlasted the administration of Donald Trump, who began a trade war with Beijing, but escalated in areas including the Indo-Pacific and US engagement with Taiwan.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said on Monday that relations were at a critical point and Xi would exchange frank views with Biden on a wide range of issues.

“We hope the US can be accommodating to China, manage differences and sensitive issues, and stick to the path of mutual respect and peaceful engagement,” he said.

Last week, a group of US lawmakers paid a surprise visit to Taiwan, organised by Washington’s de facto embassy on the self-ruled island.

Beijing called the trip an act of provocation and dispatched a military patrol towards the Taiwan Strait to test its forces’ combat readiness. It followed a visit to Taiwan in June by three US senators to discuss plans to donate Covid-19 vaccines, and talks in April between former US officials and Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen – respectively prompting Beijing to issue a warning and send warplanes to harass the island.

The Chinese government has repeatedly warned Washington against having formal contact with Taiwan, which it views as a breakaway province that must be brought under its control, by force if necessary.

In total in October, China sent more than 200 fighter jets, its most yet, into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone in an attempt to intimidate Tsai’s government.

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On Friday, in a call with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington supported “peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait”, and expressed concern over China’s military, diplomatic and economic pressure against the island.

Biden is also expected to raise concerns about a host of other issues from industrial subsidies to alleged forced labour in Xinjiang.

However, tariffs would not be on the agenda, the official said, without elaborating on the reasons. Business sectors have been pressing the administration to adjust its trade policy, with the US-China Business Council, representing more than 200 US companies, on Saturday saying it had written to US trade representative Katherine Tai and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen asking for tariffs on Chinese goods to be removed to restore US companies’ competitiveness.

A meeting last week of Communist Party officials that elevated Xi’s status by passing a rare “historical resolution” had added to the virtual summit’s urgency, the Biden administration official said.

The “continued centralisation of power in Xi Jinping’s hands” had “further cemented, in our mind, the importance of this leader-level engagement”, she said.

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The Biden administration was “trying to shape the international environment in a way that is favourable to us, our allies and partners”, rather than trying to change China through bilateral engagement, which was not realistic, she said.

No “major deliverables or outcomes” should be expected from the meeting, she said, echoing White House press secretary Jen Psaki, who said on Friday that the engagement was about “setting the terms, in our view, of an effective competition where we’re in a position to defend our values”.

The two countries last week issued a surprise joint statement at the COP26 climate change summit committing to work together on the environment. In a visit to China earlier in the year, US climate envoy John Kerry had been unable to strike a deal with Beijing on climate action, with Chinese officials saying Washington should not expect China’s cooperation on that and nuclear non-proliferation while tensions remained in other areas.

The White House official said on Sunday that China being willing to act on an existential crisis such as climate change was “in its interest”, not “a favour to us”, and would “not alter the nature of the bilateral relationship”.

Additional reporting by Catherine Wong

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: issue of Taiwan looms large at xi-biden summit