For the first time in seven months, US President Joe Biden met Thursday, September 9, with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, the White House announced.

The two leaders discussed the need to prevent competition between the world's two largest economies from degenerating into conflict.

This is the first telephone interview between the two leaders since February.

Mr. Biden had just recently succeeded Donald Trump, and had spent two hours on the phone with Mr. Xi.

In a statement, the White House said Joe Biden and Xi Jinping had a "strategic discussion" including "topics where our interests converge and others where our interests, values ​​and expectations diverge."

Chinese state media reported that the conversation was "deep" and "frank."

The tensions evoked

The Chinese president told his US counterpart that Washington's attitude towards Beijing has caused "serious difficulties" for bilateral relations, state media reported.

"The future and the fate of the world depend on the ability of China and the United States to manage their relations properly. This is the question of the century, which the two countries will have to answer," Xi said, quoted by public television CCTV.

For his part, Joe Biden made it clear to Xi Jinping that the United States wanted "that the dynamics remain competitive" but that the situation should not degenerate "into an unforeseen conflict", indicated the White House.

Since the first phone call between Xi Jinping and Joe Biden in February, the occasional high-level meetings have yielded little progress on a large number of issues.

The list of bilateral disagreements is long and growing.

In addition to trade, there is also the question of Taiwan, the Covid-19, the treatment of the ethnic Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region (northwest China) or the struggle for influence of the two countries at sea. from southern China.

With AFP and Reuters

The summary of the week

France 24 invites you to come back to the news that marked the week

I subscribe

Take international news everywhere with you!

Download the France 24 application

google-play-badge_FR