The presidents of the United States and China, Joe Biden and Xi Jinping, organized a long-awaited meeting on the Indonesian island of Bali this Monday, which followed months of secret negotiations and that began to take shape in a phone call between the two leaders in the middle of the year, US officials revealed on Monday.
Biden and Xi spoke in July during the hoursamid tensions over the imminent visit to Taiwan by the Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, and at that time both highlighted the value” that he would have a face-to-face meeting, as the White House explained at the time.
That was the moment when the two leaders They have asked their teams to start preparing for the meeting.
Format and themes
What followed the phone call between Biden and Xi was “dozens of hours of quiet diplomacy behind the scenes” and months of negotiations in which the US and Chinese teams tried to reach agreements on the matter the format of the meeting Y the arguments that would be addressed, officials said.
“Each of the issues related to this appointment, from foreign policy issues to logistics, has been carefully considered, negotiated and agreed on both sides,” one of the sources stressed.
One of the key moments that accelerated the process was the meeting that the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, had in September in New York on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi.
That face-to-face served to give birth to the idea that, after a period of dispute between the two powers, it was necessary and “natural” that the two leaders could talk, especially considering that both were to meet at the G20 in Bali, the officials explained.
These sources explained that the negotiations brought them out many of the differences between the two powers, but described the process as “serious, sustained and professional”, example of the “tradition” of US-China diplomacy.
They also considered that these exchanges, in themselves, already have a very important value for the bilateral relationship.
Indeed, Biden came to the meeting with the firm goal of establishing channels of communication with Xi to avoid misunderstandings and establish “clear rules of the road” that prevent competition between Beijing and Washington from escalating into conflict, according to officials.
Following the negotiations, it was agreed that the two leaders would meet face to face accompanied by “a small” group of advisers.
The exchange included simultaneous translation and lasted about two hours, according to the White House.
Tensions around Taiwan and in the South China Sea were estimated to be on the table, as were North Korea’s missile and trade tensions, particularly tariffs which former President Donald Trump (2017-2021) imposed on Chinese imports and which Biden maintained.
It was the first in-person meeting between Biden and Xi since the American arrived at the White House in January 2021, though both have had five phone calls in the past 20 months.
The last time they saw each other in person was in January 2017, when they both met at the World Economic Forum in Davos and Biden served as Vice President to Barack Obama (2009-2017).
The author is an EFE journalist
ap
Source: Clarin
