President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping will meet in California on Wednesday for talks on trade, Taiwan, and managing tense US-China ties, in the first meeting between the world’s two largest economies in over a year, news agency AP reported. The White House had stated for weeks that Biden and Xi would meet on the margins of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference in San Francisco, but talks fell through on the day of the event, which begins Saturday.
According to White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, the leaders will talk about the “continued importance of maintaining open lines of communication” and how they “can continue to responsibly manage competition and work together where our interests align, particularly on transnational challenges that affect the international community.”
According to a statement issued by China’s Foreign Ministry on Friday, Xi will attend APEC from Tuesday to November 17 at Biden’s request and will participate in the US-China meeting.
Two senior Biden administration officials, who briefed reporters earlier on the condition of anonymity under White House ground rules, said the leaders will meet in the San Francisco Bay region but declined to provide additional specifics due to security concerns. During the summit, thousands of protestors are expected to converge on San Francisco.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng met in San Francisco on Thursday, the latest in a series of senior-level meetings between the two countries in recent months aimed at alleviating tensions. Yellen and He are scheduled to meet again on Friday.
The Biden-Xi encounter is unlikely to result in any substantial announcements, and disagreements between the two powers are unlikely to be resolved. According to one source, Biden is more concerned with “managing the competition, preventing the downside risk of conflict, and ensuring channels of communication are open,” AP reported. According to authorities, this would be Xi’s first visit to San Francisco since he was a young Communist Party leader.
There is no shortage of challenging problems on the agenda.
Differences in the already complicated US-China relationship have widened in the last year, with Beijing resentful of new US export controls on advanced technology; Biden ordering the shooting down of a Chinese spy balloon after it crossed the continental United States; and Chinese resentment of Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s stopover in the US earlier this year, among other issues. China claims ownership of the island.
Biden will also likely urge Xi on leveraging China’s influence on North Korea, given the accelerated tempo of North Korean ballistic missile testing and Pyongyang’s provision of armaments to Russia for its war in Ukraine.