White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan is visiting China next week to discuss key global issues and aim to set up new meetings between Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Sullivan will be in Beijing from Tuesday to Thursday next week, becoming the first national security adviser to visit China since 2016, according to a senior Biden administration official.
The official said Sullivan will speak about key issues including tensions in the South China Sea, the war in the Middle East and China’s provision of non-lethal technology to Russia for use in the war in Ukraine.
The official added that U.S.-China relations are marked by “intense competition” but the talks will aim to manage those challenges responsibly.
“We are committed to making investments, strengthening our alliances, and taking the commonsense steps necessary on technology and national security,” the official said. “We are committed to managing this competition responsibly.” [and prevent it] This is to prevent conflict from arising.”
During his visit, Sullivan is scheduled to meet with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, director of the Office of the Communist Party of China’s Foreign Affairs Commission.
In previous summits, Sullivan and Wang have laid the groundwork for a meeting between Biden and Xi, and with this visit Sullivan aims to set up a meeting between the two leaders later this year. According to Axios.
Biden last met with Xi in California in November 2023, a significant meeting in which the two leaders agreed to strengthen friendly relations.
Since that meeting, the United States and China have reopened military-to-military communication channels and President Xi has pledged to crack down more on Chinese-sourced raw materials used to make fentanyl, a drug that afflicts Americans.
These two themes, along with the safe development of AI technologies, are expected to be on the agenda for Sullivan’s visit.
“The purpose of this strategic-level communication is to provide in-depth policy detail, how we view different situations,” the official said. “Above all, it’s to clear up misunderstandings and to prevent this competition from escalating into conflict.”
Further talks with Xi could lead to further progress on those goals and would also bolster Biden’s foreign policy efforts as he looks to finish out his final few months in office following his decision not to seek reelection and to endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Still, China and the United States remain at odds over key issues, including China’s desire to reunify with the self-governing island nation of Taiwan, by force if necessary, and China’s territorial claims over the South China Sea, which have led to a clash with the Philippines.
The voyage is threatened by a collision between a Chinese and a Philippine ship this week that came after Beijing and Manila reached an agreement to allow the Philippines to resupply the crew of a ship that ran aground on a disputed reef in the South China Sea.
But a dispute over Taiwan remains one of the most tense issues, and while Xi has ordered the military to be ready by 2027, that is not technically seen as a deadline for an invasion.
The United States has informal ties with Taiwan but remains committed to supporting the island, and senior administration officials have described the issue as a “continuous process of dialogue.”
“Continued dialogue between the two sides is necessary,” the official said. “We continue to believe that direct and meaningful dialogue between Taipei and Beijing is the only way to address these issues head-on.”
