U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met on Monday with Chinese President Xi Jinping and said they agreed to “stabilize” badly deteriorated U.S.-China ties, but America's top diplomat left Beijing with his biggest ask rebuffed: better communications between their militaries.
After meeting Xi, Blinken said China is not ready to resume military-to-military contacts, something the U.S. considers crucial to avoid miscalculation and conflict, particularly over Taiwan.
Blinken said later that the U.S. set limited objectives for the trip and achieved them. He told reporters before leaving for a Ukraine reconstruction conference in London that he had raised the issue of military to military communications “repeatedly.” “The Chinese side has made our position clear, and the two sides have agreed to follow through the common understandings President Biden and I had reached in Bali,” Xi said.
Blinken described his earlier discussions with senior Chinese officials as “candid and constructive.” Before meeting with Xi, Blinken met earlier Monday with China's top diplomat Wang Yi for about three hours, an encounter that produced a harsh assessment of the talks. In the first round of talks on Sunday, Blinken met for nearly six hours with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang, after which both countries said they had agreed to continue high-level discussions.
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