Chinese Politburo member Yang Jiechi, in charge of foreign affairs, and Foreign Minister Wang Yi arrived in Anchorage, Alaska, in the early morning hours of the 18th, and met with Secretary of State Blinken and National Security Adviser Sullivan for the first high-level U.S.-China diplomatic meeting since the Biden administration took office. The Wall Street Journal reported on the 18th that the two sides have vastly different perceptions of the meeting and the difficulties in repairing the relationship.
Citing sources familiar with the matter, the WSJ reported that today’s meeting gave both sides a chance to reset the treacherous bilateral relationship between the world’s two largest economies. In a delicate atmosphere ahead of the meeting, U.S. officials said the U.S. will use the talks to express concerns about certain Chinese actions, such as China’s restrictions on freedom in Hong Kong, expansion of naval power in the South China Sea, economic pressure on U.S. allies, violations of intellectual property rights and breaches of cybersecurity. During his visit to Japan and South Korea, Blinken spoke about human rights in China, and the State Department issued its latest report on the situation in Hong Kong, as required by the Hong Kong autonomy law, finding that 24 Chinese and Hong Kong officials had undermined Hong Kong’s autonomy and imposing sanctions. In contrast to the U.S. orientation, Yang Jiechi and Wang Yi will ask Blinken and Sullivan in person to reverse the sanctions and restrictions imposed on Chinese entities and individuals during the Trump presidency, as well as the U.S. visa restrictions on Chinese Communist Party members, Chinese students and representatives of state-run media, and the decision to close the Chinese Consulate General in Houston last year.
The Wall Street Journal said the vast differences between the two sides’ perceptions of the meeting underscore the difficulty of repairing relations.
In response to Chinese expectations, a senior Biden Administration official said this was a one-Time meeting and that there would be no joint statement afterwards, with the U.S. and China issuing their own press releases.
The Wall Street Journal quoted Kevin Rudd, former Australian prime minister and president of the Asia Policy Institute, a New York-based think tank, as saying in a television interview with CNBC that the Anchorage meeting would not lead to any great breakthroughs and was “more of a mere dialogue than a pragmatic level of problem-solving.”
David Brown, a visiting professor at Johns Hopkins University, responded to an inquiry from the Wall Street Journal, saying that Burken’s visit to Japan and South Korea and his return trip to Alaska for the U.S.-China talks made it clear that “allies come first” and that the U.S. appeared to want to make its position clear at the meeting, while China wanted to The U.S. seems to want to express its position in this meeting, and China wants to use it to ease bilateral tensions, so he believes the U.S. should not agree to follow-up dialogue or action.
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