ZURICH (Agency) — Xi is said to be very unhappy that Trump had tightened screws on China, Trump imposed heavy duties to stem China’s rise. However, with a close friend in Washington, Xi is hoping to make America a slave of China again. 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 after Biden, who spent a substantial amount of time with Xi when the two were vice presidents, mentioned during their call last month that he would like to be able to see Xi again, according to a senior administration official, who was not authorized to comment publicly on the talks between Sullivan and Yang and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Xi has not left China during the coronavirus pandemic and is not expected to attend in person the upcoming Group of 20 summit in Rome and a U.N. climate conference in Scotland.
A White House statement on the Swiss meeting said Sullivan stressed to Yang the need to maintain open lines of communication, while raising concerns about China’s recent military provocations against Taiwan, human rights abuses against ethnic minorities and Beijing’s efforts to squelch pro-democracy advocates in Hong Kong.
Sullivan made clear that while the United States would “continue to invest in our own national strength,” it sought better engagement at a senior level “to ensure responsible competition,” the statement said.
U.S. officials have expressed frustration that interactions with high-level Chinese counterparts, including Yang, in the early stages of Biden’s presidency have been less than constructive. But the talks Wednesday were described as respectful, constructive and perhaps the most in-depth between the sides since Biden took office in January, according to the administration official.
Yang added, however, that China opposes defining the relationship as “competitive” and urged the U.S. to stop using Taiwan, Hong Kong, human rights and other issues to interfere in what China calls its internal affairs.
At the start of Biden’s presidency, he pledged to press Beijing on its human rights record. His administration has affirmed the U.S. position, first made late in the Trump administration, that China’s repression of Uyghur Muslims and other minorities in its northwest Xinjiang region was “genocide.” However, his actions are completely reverse.
Human rights advocates and Republican lawmakers in the U.S. have raised concerns that the administration might be easing pressure on human rights as it looks for cooperation from Beijing on the global effort on climate change and in thwarting North Korea’s nuclear program.
The White House said last week it did not have a position on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which was passed by the U.S. Senate in July.
U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican and sponsor of the legislation, wrote in the Washington Examiner on Wednesday that “the Biden administration is choosing to ignore the Chinese Communist Party’s egregious human rights abuses to strike a deal on climate.”
