Joe Biden and Xi Jinping on Wednesday reestablished a dialogue that had been pending for a year, but also exposed their differences in broad daylight, in particular on Taiwan. Tellingly, the American president said at the conclusion of a press conference, intended to welcome the outcome of the summit, that he still considered his Chinese counterpart to be a “dictator”.
“He is a dictator in the sense that here is a man who runs a country, a communist country, which is based on a form of government totally different from ours,” he said, using an expression which sparked controversy. anger from Beijing in the past.
Resumption of high-level military communications
The meeting will, however, lead to a resumption of high-level military communications, suspended for more than a year, the two superpowers said.
The four-hour summit, held in a plush residence about forty kilometers from San Francisco, was “constructive and productive”, according to Joe Biden. The 80-year-old Democrat assured that the two men could pick up the phone and speak to each other “directly and immediately” in the event of a crisis. Because the meeting, intended to give an impression of newfound serenity – Joe Biden and Xi Jinping, for example, briefly showed themselves to photographers during a short walk in a pretty garden – obviously did not resolve any substantive dispute.
Substantial measures to reduce supplies of fentanyl components
President Xi certainly agreed to take, according to the Americans, “a number of significant measures to significantly reduce supplies” of fentanyl components. This powerful synthetic opiate produced with chemical compounds originating in particular from China causes tens of thousands of overdoses each year in the United States. The announcement is welcome for Joe Biden, campaigning for a second term and regularly accused by his Republican opponents of not doing enough against drug trafficking. Washington and Beijing have also decided to mobilize a group of experts to discuss the risks linked to artificial intelligence.
Xi Jinping, faced with a degraded economic and social situation in China, does not want to appear weakened, particularly with regard to Taiwan. The status of the island, of which Beijing claims sovereignty, and where a presidential election will soon take place, remains a central subject of friction.
On Wednesday, Joe Biden asked Xi to “respect the electoral process” and confirmed the deliberately ambiguous line of the United States: no support for independence, but refusal of a takeover by force. The Chinese president, for his part, urged his counterpart to “stop arming Taiwan”, since reunification is, according to him, “inevitable”, indicated a source in Chinese diplomacy.
Washington expects Beijing not to aggravate major international crises
Washington also expects China, a close partner of Iran and Russia, not to aggravate major international crises: the conflict between Israel and Hamas as well as the war in Ukraine.
The two men had a meeting with their respective delegations, then a small working lunch – tarragon chicken and almond cake on the menu – and finally a one-on-one walk, clearly organized for photographers and cameras. A summit adjusted to the millimeter, after weeks of negotiations, in an estate nestled in the Californian hills, which served, for the anecdote, as a setting for the poisonous intrigues of the king soap opera of the 1980s, “Dynasty”.
The American president had called, at the start of the meeting, to manage the rivalry in a “responsible” manner, to “ensure that it does not degenerate into conflict”. Xi Jinping, who warned of the “unbearable” consequences of a confrontation, estimated, according to an English translation, that China and the United States could not “turn their backs” on each other. “The planet is big enough for our two countries to prosper,” he assured, while Washington and Beijing are engaged in fierce competition, whether economic, technological, strategic or military. However, he informed Joe Biden that American economic sanctions harm China’s “legitimate interests”, according to state media.
Xi Jinping and Joe Biden last spoke in November 2022, on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali. The bilateral relationship then continued to deteriorate, even threatening to be seriously derailed by the flight over American territory by a Chinese balloon at the start of the year. Washington had denounced a espionage operation, which China had denied.
In March, the Chinese president denounced an American strategy of “encirclement”, while the United States is strengthening its alliances in the Asia-Pacific and piling economic sanctions on China. However, the tone softened enough in the summer to allow the organization of the Californian face-to-face.