Despite a rivalry between Beijing and Washington which makes communications complicated, dialogue continues between the two great powers. Joe Biden and Xi Jinping spoke on the telephone on Tuesday April 2, to discuss current issues and above all to reaffirm their differences of views.
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“ A frank and constructive dialogue “, this is how diplomats talk about meetings where disagreements are agreed. It was in this spirit that this nearly two-hour phone call took place, the first since their interview last November near San Francisco. They promised to stay in touch and manage their competition responsibly. This had not always been the case before the summit, particularly for communications between military personnel which had become non-existent.
Xi Jinping and Joe Biden took stock of their rare areas of agreement: the fight against drug trafficking, against climate change, the risks linked to artificial intelligence and maintaining lines of communication. The White House mentioned in a press release a conversation focusing as much on the possibilities of “ cooperation » than on the “ disputes “.
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Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Secretary of State Antony Blinken will visit China soon. They will be able to take stock of everything that the United States criticizes China: its commercial practices, its pressure on Taiwan, its increasingly threatening military presence against freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, attempts at interference in this American election year and its support for the Russian war machine in Ukraine. As well as his attempts to obtain cutting-edge technologies that the United States does everything to deny him.
On this subject, Xi Jinping, who sees this as a desire to undermine Chinese technological development, made his counterpart understand that Beijing does not “ would not stand idly by » in the face of restrictions imposed by Washington to limit exports to China of certain advanced technologies, which American authorities fear could be used for military purposes.
The warning did not have much effect on the American president, who according to the White House intends ” continue to make decisions necessary to prevent cutting-edge U.S. technologies from being used in ways that compromise national security ” the United States.
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