“If you don’t make progress, it means you’re going backwards.” As he usually does, Xi Jinping summarized the meaning of the meeting with Antony Blinken with an ancient Chinese saying. The US Secretary of State was received by the Chinese President in the afternoon, at the end of his three-day visit. Both sides stressed several times that the goal of the talks was to maintain dialogue, but they used the occasion above all to reiterate how much they disagree. «We should be partners, not rivals. We are ready to cooperate but it takes two to do so”, said Xi, before sending some barbs. “You can’t say one thing and then do another,” he accused, before inviting Washington not to engage in “small circles”, in reference to US regional maneuvers which according to China are aimed at building a sort of NATO Asian dedicated to its containment.
ALSO BLINKEN he did not spare criticism. At the end of the meetings, he declared to CNN that there was evidence of China’s attempt to “influence and interfere” with the US presidential elections next November: “We consider it totally unacceptable”, he said, before underlining the possible adoption of new sanctions against Chinese financial institutions for alleged support for Russia: «We are fully ready to take action to take additional measures. I said it very clearly. Russia would have more problems in the war against Ukraine if it did not have China’s support. And in doing so it is helping to fuel the greatest threat to Europe’s security since the end of the Cold War.”
The issue of the alleged shipment of dual-use components and goods was at the center of the discussions between Blinken and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, the real diplomatic heart of the day. The American accusations are branded as “false” and “hypocritical”. From the Chinese perspective, it is precisely the US that is “adding fuel to the fire” by continuing to send weapons to Ukraine instead of encouraging negotiations. A position that Wang reiterated, warning: “Relations have generally stabilized, but negative factors continue to increase and accumulate” so much so that relations risk returning to a “downward spiral”. Among the main issues there is obviously Taiwan, the first of the “red lines” that Wang asked the US “not to tread on” on “China’s sovereignty, security and development interests”. In Beijing they will carefully observe the movements of the American delegation sent to the inauguration of the new Taiwanese president Lai Ching-te, scheduled for May 20th.
THE REFERENCE of Wang, however, is not only the Strait, but also the territorial disputes with the Philippines in the South China Sea and the strengthening of Washington’s alliance system in the Asia-Pacific. When Wang talks about development he instead thinks of the restrictions and tariffs that the US could soon introduce on batteries, solar panels and electric cars.
Blinken explained that the TikTok dossier did not emerge in the talks, but in the meantime the Chinese parent company ByteDance does not seem willing to sell the short video app, as the law signed in recent days by Joe Biden requires it to do within nine months. The algorithm is too important, also underlying the functioning of Douyin, the “Chinese twin” of TikTok. Without a complicated separation of the algorithms, which could allow it to avoid the Beijing government’s no, the company would prefer to face the ban. Provided that TikTok is defeated in a legal battle that it has already announced it intends to fight in all possible venues.
AMONG MANY obstacles, there are also some glimmers of cooperation. For example on artificial intelligence, a topic on which the first bilateral talks have been announced in the coming weeks. Also relevant was the meeting between Blinken and Wang Xiaohong, Minister of Public Security, during which it was agreed to intensify the fight against illegal trafficking of fentanyl, the opioid responsible for tens of thousands of deaths a year in the United States.
COMMON hope also for the increase in cultural and university exchanges, while Blinken recognized China’s possible role in “promoting the reduction of tensions in the Middle East”. In these hours, among other things, representatives of Hamas and Fatah are apparently speaking in China. According to the Lebanese newspaper al-Liwaa, two delegations are in Beijing. The first would be led by the deputy head of the Hamas political bureau, Moussa Abu Marzouk, the second by the member of the Fateh central committee, Azzam al-Ahmad. In mid-March, Chinese envoy Wang Kejian met with Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Qatar.
