Last Monday, Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping met before the Group of Twenty Summit in Bali, Indonesia. Their statements indicating a calm toward global tensions is a victory for diplomacy and peacemakers around the world.
Formal communications between Washington and Beijing had stopped after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s provocative visit to Taiwan in August. A high-ranking official such as Pelosi visiting Taiwan was a slap in the face of the US commitment to the one-China policy, which has been the bedrock of peaceful US-China relations for 50 years.
When the US and China established diplomatic relations, the two countries issued the 1972 Shanghai Communiqué, proclaiming that “there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China.”
China has made it clear that Taiwan is a red line since Day 1. Even the Pentagon cautioned against Pelosi’s visit. After this slap in the face, Beijing halted important dialogues including on climate change, economy, and public health.
The situation was made worse by the advancement of the Taiwan Policy Act of 2022, Biden’s repeated promise to involve the US militarily in a potential conflict between China and Taiwan, and the White House’s National Security Strategy prioritizing competition with China.
US politicians often portray China as seeking to cause conflict. However, according to a story in Politico, leading up to Monday, Chinese officials showed reluctance to move forward with the Biden-Xi meeting.
“Chinese diplomats are saying, you guys whack us every other day – if that is the environment, how can we expect a positive outcome from a Xi-Biden meeting?” a person briefed by Chinese officials on the planning told Politico. “If they can’t have a positive outcome, their view is, should we even have the meeting?”
China has repeatedly called the US to the negotiation table, even after the White House released the National Security Strategy that aims to “out-compete China.” However, the US keeps crossing the red line, which has made China lose faith in productive diplomacy.
As a former senior US official said to a Bloomberg reporter, “the hawkish tone in DC has contributed to a cycle where the US makes the first move, interprets Chinese reactions as a provocation, and then escalates further.”
With this mechanism, the US seeks to undermine China to maintain US hegemony. However, American politicians need to realize that the unipolar world under US domination is neither sustainable nor just. The US empire must listen and yield space to not only China, but also other sovereign countries, to ensure peace in an increasingly multipolar world and simply show respect to humanity.
Frozen US-China relations are beginning to thaw after the Biden-Xi meeting, as the two leaders agreed on the importance of cooperation between the two countries, not just for themselves but for the very serious issues facing the world.
According to a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affair readout, Xi said, “Humanity is confronted with unprecedented challenges.… The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle their relationship.”
Biden echoed that sentiment in a White House readout: “The United States and China must work together to address transnational challenges … because that is what the international community expects.” At the same time, Biden insisted that the US will continue competing with China “vigorously,” although the competition should not escalate into conflicts.
Formal communications between Washington and Beijing are back. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is set to visit China. In a press conference following the meeting, Biden said there was “no need for concern” of “a new Cold War.”
On the topic that has been the accelerant of recent US-China tension, Biden reaffirmed US commitment to the one-China policy and said he did not think “there’s any imminent attempt on the part of China to invade Taiwan.”
What has transpired in the past few months is a lesson for the world. Provocations only escalate into conflict, but through responsible diplomacy we can make peace and mutual respect with one another.
US politicians need to learn that China is not America’s enemy. The enemy is climate change. The enemy is poverty. The enemy is the potential for another global pandemic. When diplomacy fails, dialogues stop, and the world suffers in consequence. When diplomacy succeeds, the international community can cooperate and manage the complexities we share as citizens of this fragile planet Earth.
Activist efforts channeled the sentiments of global public opinion, and engendered the atmosphere of urgent constructive dialogue between Xi and Biden, with world leaders echoing for Biden to do the right thing with China: Quit making countries choose sides and to tone it down – the preconditions of a more harmonious international order.
This article was provided by Globetrotter.