The Chinese president met Joe Biden on Monday, November 14, for more than three hours, while Emmanuel Macron tried on Tuesday morning to convince him to intervene with Vladimir Putin concerning the war in Ukraine.
by Frédéric Lemaître (Beijing, correspondent), Brice Pedroletti (Bali, Special Envoy) and Philippe Ricard (Bali, Special Envoy)
Like an athlete long absent from competition due to “zero covid” policy, Xi Jinping decided to do his international school year in two stages this fall. First a warm-up in Uzbekistan, in mid-September, where it was a question of finding a group of friendly countries, gathered in the Shanghai cooperation organization (OCS). It was an opportunity to meet Russian president Vladimir Putin. Then, this week, the real competition, the global arena, the G20 of Bali (Indonesia), where, his absent Russian partner, the Chinese president confronts Westerners, more than eight months after the triggering of the Russian invasion in Ukraine.
Lifting the curtain, the meeting with Joe Biden on Monday, November 14, held his promises. The two leaders, who had maintained themselves five times from a distance since 2020, shaken hands, without mask. Their maintenance lasted more than three hours.
m. Biden and XI first chose to storm kindness. The American president, rejected by mid-term elections from which he comes out in part winner, is not, unlike his predecessor Donald Trump, the kind to humiliate his opponents. “It is a real pleasure to see you again,” he said at the start of their meeting, in the hotel where his counterpart resides. For his part, Xi Jinping, now guaranteed to stay in power as long as he wishes, is not in a hurry. Its objective is to continue the modernization of his country so that he became the first world power in 2049. “We must find the right way so that this bilateral relationship goes forward and rises,” he insured.
The Chinese part refrained, this time, to criticize “the Cold War Mentality” of American leaders or their “hegemony”. Joe Biden said he did not want “new cold war”. Asked at the press conference, just after the meeting on his impressions of the Chinese leader, he said that he had “found him as he was always, direct and frank”. “I am convinced that he understood what I said and I understood what he was saying,” he added. On the merits, however, no progress has been noted. The United States and China did not publish a joint declaration at the end of the meeting and moreover no one expected it to be otherwise.
Taïwan, ” At the heart of the vital interests of China “
The Chinese press release released very quickly after the interview takes good care to specify that Xi Jinping began by explaining to Joe Biden the essential elements of the XXth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCC) which ended on October 22: “Great continuity and high stability.” So there is no change to expect from Beijing. Xi Jinping intends to “promote the great revival of the Chinese nation on all levels”. Including therefore military. Besides, if the PCC does not pretend to dominate the world, it does not intend to make any concessions, especially on the essential question in his eyes: Taiwan, “At the heart of the vital interests of China”.
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