China says practicing consensus important before next Xi-Biden engagement

ISTANBUL

China on Monday called on the US to provide “necessary conditions” for the next phase of engagement between the leaders of the two countries.

“China hopes that the US will put into practice the consensus reached by the two countries' presidents in their phone calls,” said Wang Wenbin, spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry.

Early in September, President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Joe Biden held wide-ranging discussions in a phone call where they gave reassurances that the world’s top two economies will hold “more candid exchanges and constructive dialogues to avoid misunderstandings, misjudgments, and unexpected conflicts.”

Urging Washington to make political preparations for the engagement, Wang said Beijing also expects the US side to “provide the necessary conditions for the next phase of engagement” between the two leaders, Chinese daily Global Times reported.

Xi had argued that the China policy “adopted by the US for some time has caused serious difficulties in Sino-US relations.”

The call for putting into “practice the consensus” reached between the two leaders comes after Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken that the bilateral relations between the countries in the past few years “suffered an all-round impact due to the wrong China policy pursued by the US.”

“The US has wantonly interfered with China's internal affairs,” Wang said.

The two met on Sunday in Rome on the sidelines of the G20 summit.

The Chinese foreign minister said the current US Congress has introduced more than 300 “anti-China bills, and the US has included more than 900 Chinese entities and individuals in various unilateral sanctions lists, which severely disrupted the normal bilateral exchanges.”

“The US is also patching up various small circles to suppress China on a global scale, and even exerting pressure on many small and medium-sized countries,” Wang said.

“These practices are not in line with the interests of the peoples of the two countries, not in line with the expectations of the international community, not in line with the development trend of the times, and hence China voices its clear opposition,” he added.