NUSA DUA, Indonesia — China’s support for Russia’s war in Ukraine is complicating US-China relations at a time when they are already beset by disagreements and animosity over many other issues, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken told his Chinese counterpart on Saturday.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi blamed the US for the decline in relations and said US policy had been derailed by what he called a misperception of China as a threat.
“Many people believe that the United States suffers from China phobia,” he said, according to a Chinese statement. “If such an expansion of threat is allowed to grow, US policy towards China will be a dead end with no way out.”
In five hours of talks in their first face-to-face meeting since October, Blinken said he expressed deep concern about China’s position on Russia’s actions in Ukraine and did not believe Beijing’s protestations that it was neutral in the conflict.
The talks were organized in a new attempt to contain, or at least contain, the burgeoning hostility that has defined recent relations between Washington and Beijing.
“We are concerned about China’s alignment with Russia,” Blinken told reporters after the meeting in the Indonesian resort of Bali. He said it was difficult to be “neutral” in a conflict where there is a clear aggressor, but that even that was possible, “I don’t believe China is acting in a way that is neutral.”
The Chinese statement said the two countries had an in-depth exchange of views on Ukraine, but did not provide details.
The Biden administration had hoped that China, with its long history of opposing what it sees as interference in its own internal affairs, would take a similar stance with Russia and Ukraine. But it didn’t, opting instead for what US officials see as a hybrid position that damages the international rules-based order.
Blinken said any nation, including China, stands to lose if that order is undermined.
The two men met a day after they both attended a meeting of senior diplomats from the Group of 20 rich and major developing countries that ended without a common call to end Russia’s war in Ukraine or a plan to deal with its effects on food and energy security.
But Blinken said he believed Russia came out of the G20 meeting isolated and alone, as most participants expressed opposition to the war in Ukraine. However, the ministers failed to reach a unified G-20 call for an end to the conflict.
“There was a strong consensus and Russia was left isolated,” Blinken said of the individual condemnations of Russia’s actions by various ministers, some of whom avoided talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
He noted that Lavrov had left the meeting early, possibly because he did not like what he was hearing from his colleagues.
“It was very important that he hear loud and clear from around the world the condemnation of Russia’s aggression,” Blinken said, adding: “We don’t see any signs that Russia is ready to engage in diplomacy right now.”
On China, Blinken said he and Wang discussed a range of contentious issues from tariffs and trade and human rights to Taiwan and disputes in the South China Sea, which have been complicated by China’s stance on Ukraine.
Wang called on the US to remove tariffs on Chinese imports as soon as possible, stop interfering in his country’s internal affairs and refrain from harming its interests in the name of human rights and democracy. He also accused the US of using “salami-slicing” tactics on Taiwan, a self-governing island that China claims as its territory and says should come under its control.
Just two days earlier, the two countries’ top militaries faced off against Taiwan in a virtual meeting. Blinken said he stressed US concern about China’s “increasingly provocative rhetoric and activity near Taiwan and the vital importance of maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.” He added that he had also raised human rights concerns regarding minorities in Tibet and the western Xinjiang region.
Wang refuted some “misconceived US views” on Xinjiang, Hong Kong and the South China Sea, the Chinese statement said.
U.S. officials previously said they did not expect a breakthrough from Blinken’s talks with Wang. But they said they hoped the talk could help keep the lines of communication open and create “railings” to guide the world’s two largest economies as they navigate increasingly complex and potentially explosive issues.
“We are committed to managing this relationship, this competition responsibly, as the world expects us to,” Blinken said.
The United States and China have taken increasingly confrontational positions, including over Ukraine, which some fear could lead to miscalculation and conflict. The US watched warily as China refused to criticize the Russian invasion, while condemning Western sanctions against Russia and accusing the US and NATO of provoking the conflict.
At the G20 meeting, Wang made an indirect reference to China’s global stability policy, saying that “putting one’s own security above the security of others and strengthening military blocs will only divide the international community and make oneself less secure “, according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
On Thursday, Chairman of China’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Li Zuochen, chided his American counterpart, General Mark Milley, for Washington’s support for Taiwan.
Li demanded the US end military “collusion” with Taiwan, saying China had “no room for compromise” on issues affecting its “core interests”.
The meeting between Li and Milli followed fiery comments by Chinese Defense Minister Wei Fenghe at a regional security conference last month, which was also attended by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
Wei accused the United States of trying to “steal” the support of Asia-Pacific countries to turn them against Beijing, saying Washington was seeking to advance its own interests “under the guise of multilateralism.”
At the same meeting in Singapore, Austin said China was causing instability with its claims to Taiwan and its increased military activity in the area.
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Associated Press writer Ken Moritsugu in Beijing contributed to this report.
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