U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken shakes fingers with Chinese President Xi Jinping within the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, Monday, June 19, 2023.

Leah Millis/AP

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Leah Millis/AP

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken shakes fingers with Chinese President Xi Jinping within the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, Monday, June 19, 2023.

Leah Millis/AP

BEIJING — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday, as the highest U.S. diplomat wrapped up a high-stakes two-day go to to Beijing aimed toward easing hovering tensions between the nations.

The 35-minute assembly on the Great Hall of the People had been anticipated and was seen as key to the success of the journey, however neither aspect confirmed it will occur till a State Department official introduced it simply an hour beforehand.

In footage of the assembly launched by state broadcaster CCTV, Xi is heard to say “The two sides have agreed to follow through on the common understandings President Biden and I have reached in Bali.”

In earlier conferences between Blinken and senior Chinese officers, the 2 sides expressed willingness to speak however confirmed little inclination to bend from hardened positions on disagreements starting from commerce, to Taiwan, to human rights circumstances in China and Hong Kong, to Chinese army assertiveness within the South China Sea, to Russia’s warfare in Ukraine.

Xi stated that that they had made progress and reached agreements on “some specific issues” with out elaborating. “This is very good,” Xi stated.

“I hope that through this visit, Mr. Secretary, you will make more positive contributions to stabilizing China-US relation,” Xi added.

Despite Blinken’s presence in China, he and different U.S. officers had performed down the prospects for any important breakthroughs on probably the most vexing points going through the planet’s two largest economies.

Instead, these officers have emphasised the significance of the 2 nations establishing and sustaining higher traces of communication.

Blinken is the highest-level U.S. official to go to China since President Joe Biden took workplace, and the primary secretary of state to make the journey in 5 years. His go to is predicted to usher in a brand new spherical of visits by senior U.S. and Chinese officers, probably together with a gathering between Xi and Biden within the coming months.

Blinken met earlier Monday with China’s high diplomat Wang Yi for about three hours, in response to a U.S. official.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote in an announcement that Blinken’s go to “coincides with a critical juncture in China-U.S. relations, and it is necessary to make a choice between dialogue or confrontation, cooperation or conflict,” and blamed the “U.S. side’s erroneous perception of China, leading to incorrect policies towards China” for the present “low point” in relations.

It stated the U.S. had a accountability to halt “the spiraling decline of China-U.S. relations to push it back to a healthy and stable track” and that Wang had “demanded that the U.S. stop hyping up the ‘China threat theory’, lift illegal unilateral sanctions against China, abandon suppression of China’s technological development, and refrain from arbitrary interference in China’s internal affairs.”

The State Department stated Blinken “underscored the importance of responsibly managing the competition between the United States and the PRC through open channels of communication to ensure competition does not veer into conflict.”

In the first round of talks on Sunday, Blinken met for almost six hours with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang after which each nations stated that they had agreed to proceed high-level discussions. However, there was no signal that any of probably the most fractious points between them have been nearer to decision.

Both the U.S. and China stated Qin had accepted an invite from Blinken to go to Washington however Beijing made clear that “the China-U.S. relationship is at the lowest point since its establishment.” That sentiment is extensively shared by U.S. officers.

Blinken’s go to comes after his preliminary plans to journey to China have been postponed in February after the shootdown of a Chinese surveillance balloon over the U.S.

A snub by the Chinese chief would have been a significant setback to the hassle to revive and keep communications at senior ranges.

Biden and Xi had made commitments to enhance communications “precisely so that we can make sure we are communicating as clearly as possible to avoid possible misunderstandings and miscommunications,” Blinken stated earlier than leaving for Beijing.

And Biden stated over the weekend that he hoped to have the ability to meet with Xi within the coming months to take up the plethora of variations that divide them.

In his conferences on Sunday, Blinken additionally pressed the Chinese to launch detained American residents and to take steps to curb the manufacturing and export of fentanyl precursors which are fueling the opioid disaster within the United States.

Xi provided a touch of a potential willingness to cut back tensions on Friday, saying in a gathering with Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates that the United States and China can cooperate to “benefit our two countries.”

Since the cancellation of Blinken’s journey in February, there have been some high-level engagements. CIA chief William Burns traveled to China in May, whereas China’s commerce minister traveled to the U.S. And Biden’s nationwide safety adviser Jake Sullivan met with senior Chinese international coverage adviser Wang Yi in Vienna in May.

But these have been punctuated by bursts of indignant rhetoric from each nations over the Taiwan Strait, their broader intentions within the Indo-Pacific, China’s refusal to sentence Russia for its warfare towards Ukraine, and U.S. allegations from Washington that Beijing is trying to spice up its worldwide surveillance capabilities, together with in Cuba.

And, earlier this month, China’s protection minister rebuffed a request from U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin for a gathering on the sidelines of a safety symposium in Singapore, an indication of continuous discontent.