After years of rising tensions between Washington and Beijing, Joe Biden and Xi Jinping found themselves face-to-face on Monday on the Indonesian island of Bali, a prelude to a G20 summit clouded by war in Ukraine.
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Nine months after launching his army to invade Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin will conspicuously miss a meeting of leaders of major world economies on Tuesday and Wednesday, the largest such meeting since the pandemic began.
Conflict in Ukraine is not officially on the event’s menu, but between energy and food prices and fears of nuclear escalation, it dominates the rifts that threaten to come to light between Westerners gathered in the tropics and nations of the South. Island.
A first glimpse of the tone of the event will be provided on Monday with a meeting between the US president and his Chinese counterpart, who arrived in Bali on Sunday evening, the first in their current roles.
The two, who have known each other for a decade, have no shortage of topics to discuss. In addition to China’s refusal to condemn the Russian invasion, Washington and Beijing have been at odds over issues ranging from trade to human rights in China’s Xinjiang region to Taiwan’s status.
Joe Biden especially wants to urge Beijing to use its influence to moderate North Korea, which has conducted a record series of missile launches and is preparing to conduct its 7th nuclear test in its history.
“I know Xi Jinping and he knows me,” Biden said, adding that they always had “frank discussions.”
“We have very few misunderstandings. We have to decide what the red lines are,” the US president said.
His National Security Adviser Jack Sullivan Mr. Biden pledged to hope for “direct” exchanges, but to find lessons for “cooperation on substantive issues.” “The United States is prepared for tough competition with China, but not seeking confrontation,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One.
Ryan Haas, a former China official at the US National Security Council, said China should not get along with President Biden during a recent meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Schalz, who said he could not be seen. for its demands on Ukraine, nuclear power or North Korea”.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who visited Indonesia on Sunday, will urge other powers to unite against ‘malign actors’ in the global economy with a subtle attack on China.
Vladimir Putin has officially decided to represent his diplomatic chief Sergei Lavrov at the G20 for scheduling reasons. But some see it as a sign that the trip is politically risky as his army retreats into southern Ukraine.
In a statement, the Russian Foreign Ministry “rejected the politicization of the G20” and called for a focus on the economic issues behind the creation of this design that unites the world’s major economies rather than the security of things under Moscow’s watch. .
Russia is expected to push for an extension of a deal that allows grain and fertilizer exports through Black Sea ports, which expires on November 19.
At the very least, Joe Biden and his allies want to get a clear message from the G20 to Vladimir Putin that a nuclear conflict is unacceptable. But even in this case, the rapprochement between China and Russia makes a common message with the West unattainable.
Indonesia, the host of the summit, has already warned that one should not necessarily expect the traditional final joint statement that traditionally ends this type of meeting.
Still, the summit will provide a rare opportunity for Western leaders, Ukraine’s supporters and the countries of the South, many of whom refuse to condemn Moscow, to talk to each other.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will be able to argue his case live via video conference.
“International cooperation is important at this brutal moment in human history and the G20 will be another opportunity to look each other in the eye,” European Council President Charles Michel said on Saturday.
