WASHINGTON — U.S. President Joe Biden stated there “needn’t be a brand new Chilly Battle” between the U.S. and China, following a three-hour summit assembly with Chinese language President Xi Jinping in Indonesia on Monday.

Biden additionally stated, “I do not suppose there’s any imminent try by China to invade Taiwan,” regardless of escalating rhetoric and aggressive army strikes by the Individuals’s Republic of China within the Taiwan Straits.

Biden and his counterpart held the much-anticipated assembly on the sidelines of the G-20 summit of economically developed nations in Bali.

Biden stated he and Xi spoke frankly, and so they agreed to ship diplomats and cupboard members from their administrations to satisfy with each other in individual to resolve urgent points.

Though they’ve spoken 5 occasions by videoconference, the assembly was the primary one Biden and Xi have held face-to-face because the U.S. president was elected in 2020. The non-public dynamic between the 2 males was pleasant, with Biden placing an arm round Xi on the outset and saying, “It is simply nice to see you.”

It stays to be seen, nevertheless, whether or not the summit will produce a real shift in relations between Washington and Beijing, its largest strategic competitor and long-term army adversary.

Beijing’s Ministry of International Affairs stated the dialog was “in-depth, candid and constructive” in a press release afterwards.

The 2 leaders reached “necessary widespread understandings,” the ministry stated, and so they have been ready now “to take concrete actions to place China-U.S. relations again on the monitor of regular improvement.”

Tensions between the 2 nations have been slowly escalating for many years, however they skyrocketed after former President Donald Trump launched a protectionist commerce struggle with China.

Since taking workplace in 2021, Biden has accomplished little to reverse Trump’s commerce insurance policies. As a substitute, he has added a brand new layer to U.S.-China hostilities by framing American international coverage as a zero-sum contest between the American dedication to human rights and free markets, and the creeping unfold of authoritarianism world wide, embodied by China’s Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Throughout their assembly, Biden additionally introduced up “considerations about PRC practices in Xinjiang, Tibet, and Hong Kong, and human rights extra broadly,” in accordance with an American readout of the summit.

Xi rejected Biden’s complaints, and he instructed the U.S. president that “freedom, democracy and human rights” have been “the unwavering pursuit” of China’s Communist Celebration, in accordance with the Ministry of International Affairs’ assertion.

Biden additionally raised Beijing’s noncompetitive financial practices, which embody widespread state intervention in personal markets and legal guidelines requiring international firms to accomplice with Chinese language companies with a view to function within the nation.

The Biden administration has responded to those insurance policies with an more and more aggressive collection of rules that restrict, and in some situations completely bar, the participation of Chinese language companies in components of the U.S. economic system, particularly which can be crucial to nationwide protection.

Each leaders reiterated every nation’s so-called “crimson strains” on the problem of Chinese language sovereignty over Taiwan, though Biden additionally sought to calm world fears of an imminent Chinese language army incursion onto the island.

Beijing continues to be livid over U.S. Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s go to to Taipei earlier this yr, which China responded to on the time by flying jets over the Taiwan Straits in what it claimed have been last-minute army workout routines. China additionally later sanctioned Pelosi personally.

In Bali on Monday, Biden stated there had been no change to U.S. coverage towards Taiwan. “I made it clear that we wish to see cross-strait points peacefully resolved, and so it by no means has to return to that. I am satisfied [Xi] understood the whole lot I used to be saying.”

North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and its current flurry of ballistic missile exams additionally got here up throughout the talks.

China continues to exert extra affect over the rogue state than some other nation, however Biden stated it wasn’t clear how far that affect extends into North Korea’s army testing routine.

“It is tough to say that I’m sure that China can management North Korea,” Biden stated. “I’ve made it clear to President Xi Jinping that I assumed [China] had an obligation to aim to make it clear to North Korea that they need to not interact in exams.”

Notably, Biden additionally stated that if China fails to influence North Korea to halt the barrage of exams, then the US may have no selection however to “take sure actions that will be extra defensive” with a view to safeguard allies South Korea and Japan.

Biden instructed the reporters in Bali that he sought to reassure Xi that these actions “wouldn’t be directed towards China, however it could be to ship a transparent message to North Korea.”

Nonetheless, the subtext was clear: If China can not rein in North Korea’s aggression, Beijing can count on to see the US shift extra army belongings to the Western Pacific and preserve a fair higher presence in China’s maritime yard.

Biden stated the 2 leaders additionally mentioned Russia’s faltering invasion of Ukraine, a delicate topic provided that China has turn out to be Russia’s financial lifeline within the wake of sanctions that reduce off Moscow’s commerce relations with a lot of the world’s main democracies, together with the US and EU member states.

Washington has been adamant that Beijing chorus from promoting weapons to Russia to be used in Ukraine, one thing China has largely prevented doing.

“We reaffirmed our shared perception that the risk or the usage of nuclear weapons is completely unacceptable,” Biden stated at a short press convention after the assembly.

Putin has repeatedly urged that Russia’s use of a nuclear weapon in Ukraine could be inside its rights, the primary time in 70 years {that a} nuclear energy has severely threatened deploying an atomic weapon to enhance standard warfare.

The unexpectedly robust efficiency of Biden’s fellow Democrats in final week’s U.S. midterm elections had strengthened his hand going into the summit, Biden stated.

“I feel the election held in the US … has despatched a really robust message world wide that the US is able to play,” stated Biden. “America is — the Republicans who survived together with the Democrats are — of the view that we will keep totally engaged on the planet and that we, actually, know what we’re about.”

Following Monday’s summit, Biden will spend the following two days in Bali assembly with G-20 world leaders, the place Russia’s struggle on Ukraine is anticipated to dominate the dialog.