Blinken’s trip to Beijing over the past two days — the minister’s first under the Biden administration — marked the resumption of high-level government meetings between the US and China after more than four tense months.
Aly Song | Reuters
BEIJING — US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday he has failed to revive military talks with China, despite earlier hopes of reopening that channel of communication.
Blinken’s trip to Beijing over the past two days — the minister’s first under the Biden administration — marked the resumption of high-level government meetings between the US and China after more than four tense months.
Military communications were broken off at this time.
The Chinese Defense Ministry declined to hold talks with its US counterpart in early February after an alleged Chinese spy balloon was spotted over US airspace. The two countries’ defense chiefs attended an annual event in Singapore earlier this month, but there was no formal meeting.
The balloon accident delayed Blinken’s visit to Beijing by more than four months. The secretary arrived on Sunday and met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, director of the Central Bureau of Foreign Affairs of the Communist Party of China Wang Yi and State Councilor and Foreign Minister Qin Gang.
Blinken told NBC News Monday that the “spy balloon” chapter should be closed.
He also told reporters Monday that during the meetings he “repeatedly” raised the need for direct communication between the two countries’ militaries.
“I think it’s absolutely vital that we have that kind of communication, military-to-military,” Blinken said. “That need was only underscored, I think, by the recent incidents we’ve seen in the air and at sea.”
“Right now, China does not agree to go ahead with this,” he said, noting that the US would continue to work to restore those communication channels.
The US shot down the alleged Chinese spy balloon in February. Beijing claims it was a weather balloon that went off course.
Earlier this month, the US Indo-Pacific Command said a Chinese warship had come within 150 meters of a US destroyer in the Taiwan Strait.
Beijing regards Taiwan as part of its territory and has no right to independently conduct diplomatic relations. The US recognizes Beijing as China’s sole government, but maintains unofficial ties with Taiwan, a democratically self-governing island.
US sanctions at play
One problem for the Chinese is that the US has imposed sanctions on Li Shangfu, China’s defense minister.
The US imposed sanctions on Li in 2018 when he was head of China’s equipment development department and oversaw Chinese purchases of Russian fighter jets and equipment.
When asked in May whether those sanctions would be lifted, even for negotiation purposes, the US State Department spokesman said no.
“On the one hand, there can be no sanctions” and on the other hand, no discussions, said Shen Yamei, director and research fellow at the American Studies department of the state-sponsored think tank China Institute of International Studies. That’s according to a CNBC translation of her Mandarin-language remarks.
She generally described Blinken’s trip to Beijing as a “very good turning point”.
Earlier, Shen told CNBC that Beijing refused to take a call to the military hotline because it would be an admission that the situation was tense – and would lead to even more extreme US action.
In China, people often didn’t answer the phone – a hotline was set up for emergencies.
Ahead of Blinken’s trip to Beijing, the US State Department said the minister had scheduled a meeting with “Senior.” [People’s Republic of China] There he will speak on the importance of maintaining open lines of communication in order to responsibly manage US-PRC relations.”
On Monday, Blinken said that following his trip, other senior US officials are likely to visit China soon and vice versa.
He said he believed there had been a “positive step” toward responsible stewardship of US-China relations through the discussions over the past few days.
Comments are closed.