The Gateway SPI Strategic Policies & Ideas
20.03.2023
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in China on the first high-level visit by a U.S. official in 5 years, a visit with three main objectives: establishing crisis management mechanisms, promoting U.S. and allied interests, and exploring areas of potential cooperation.
“If we want to make sure that the competition we have with China doesn’t turn into conflict, the first step is communication,” Blinken said.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was received by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the end of the U.S. official’s visit to Beijing. The meeting was not officially on Blinken’s schedule, an uncertainty relevant to the degree of tension between the two powers.
The meeting, which took place at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, was publicly announced just an hour before it was due to take place.
“The two sides have made progress and reached agreement on specific issues. It’s very good,” Xi told Anthony Blinken at the start of the meeting.
The Chinese leader also said he hoped Blinken’s visit would “make more contributions to stabilizing U.S.-China relations” and said “state-to-state interactions should always be based on mutual respect and sincerity.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken also met with Wang Yi, the top official in charge of diplomatic affairs within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and who actually coordinates China’s foreign policy strategies.
According to State Department spokesman Matthew Miller, the discussions were open and frank and the US secretary of state insisted on “the importance of diplomacy and keeping channels of communication open on all issues to reduce the risk of misperceptions and miscalculations”.
Wang Yi said Washington’s “misperception” of China was the “root cause” of the decline in relations between the two sides and called on the US to stop “suppressing” China’s technological development.
“We must reverse the downward spiral of China-US relations, promote a return to a healthy and stable path, and jointly find the right path for China and the United States to coexist in the new era,” Wang Yi said.
He said Blinken’s visit came at a “critical moment in U.S.-China relations where a choice must be made between dialogue or confrontation, cooperation or conflict.”
Antony Blinken’s meetings with Chinese officials revealed that the Chinese side is not willing to compromise on Taiwan, which it considers part of China.
There is international concern that the US and China might one day clash militarily over the self-ruled island of Taiwan, which China claims as its own. Also, the two powers don’t see eye to eye over a long list of issues from trade, China’s semiconductor industry, Beijing’s human rights track record and the war in Ukraine.
