EXPLAINER: Will Xi-Biden talks repair US-China ties?

BEIJING – No breakthroughs were delivered during talks betwixt Chinese person Xi Jinping and U.S. President Joe Biden, but the cordial code of the virtual gathering is an denotation that relations betwixt the sides whitethorn beryllium turning a country — adjacent if that means for present simply walking backmost from the heated exchanges of earlier this year.

Here is simply a look astatine what is driving tensions betwixt the world's 2 biggest economies and the main takeaways from the Xi-Biden talks.

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FROM WORSE TO BAD

Relations went into crisp diminution aft then-President Donald Trump imposed sweeping tariffs connected Chinese goods successful retaliation for what helium said were Beijing's unfair trading practices. The U.S. had for years been complaining of the theft oregon forced transportation of American exertion and was campaigning to support Chinese communications giants, astir notably Huawei, retired of the U.S. and different markets. The Trump medication besides sharply criticized China connected quality rights issues.

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Relations remained frosty aft Biden took office. At a gathering successful Alaska successful March, elder Chinese overseas argumentation advisor Yang Jiechi berated Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, accusing the U.S. of failing to woody with its ain quality rights problems and taking contented with what helium said was American hypocrisy.

A travel to China by America's No. 2 diplomat Wendy Sherman successful July was arsenic sour successful tone, and a consequent sojourn by U.S. clime envoy John Kerry went small better.

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CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM

Relations appeared to bottommost retired erstwhile Sullivan and Yang met again successful Switzerland past month, successful a follow-up to a telephone telephone betwixt Xi and Biden. Sullivan made wide that the United States sought amended engagement astatine a elder level “to guarantee liable competition,” according to the White House.

The gathering laid the groundwork for the virtual gathering Tuesday betwixt Xi and Biden, who person known each different since some were vice presidents. Xi referred to Biden arsenic his “old friend" and they lamented they were not gathering face-to-face earlier launching into 3 1/2 hours of discussions.

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The U.S. described the talks arsenic respectful, straightforward and open.

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CAUSES OF TENSION

The sides are astatine likelihood implicit everything from commercialized and exertion to quality rights, self-governing Taiwan and the South China Sea.

In immoderate of his astir pointed comments, Xi said “Taiwanese independency forces" and those successful the U.S. who would usage them to incorporate China were the cardinal sources of hostility implicit the land that China claims arsenic its ain territory. “We person patience and are consenting to amusement utmost sincerity and exert the top efforts to get peaceful unification," Xi said, according to China's authoritative Xinhua News Agency. “However, if the Taiwan independency separatist forces provoke and unit our hand, we volition beryllium required to instrumentality drastic measures."

Alongside “human rights much broadly,” Biden raised concerns astir China's practices successful Tibet, the crackdown successful Hong Kong, and the Uyghur homeland of Xinjiang wherever much than a cardinal person been detained successful governmental re-education camps, according to the U.S.

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Xinhua made nary notation of circumstantial quality rights issues, but quoted Xi arsenic saying that China was consenting to prosecute successful a quality rights dialog “on the ground of communal respect, but we bash not enactment utilizing quality rights to interfere successful different countries’ home affairs.”

Trade relations person besides driven strains successful bilateral ties. However, the taxable was not “a ascendant portion of the conversation,” said the U.S. official. Xi said Beijing was opposed to the “politicization of trade” and Washington's invocation of nationalist information to artifact marketplace entree for Chinese companies.

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WHERE DO THEY GO FROM HERE?

The softened rhetoric marks a large improvement. What benefits accrue depends connected whether the 2 countries tin find areas of practice and travel up with agreements, work-arounds oregon different ways of managing their disputes.

“This is an important relationship, possibly the astir consequential bilateral narration successful the world, the 2 largest economies, 2 largest militaries, 2 largest greenhouse state emitters," said Paul Haenle of the Carnegie Endowment for World Peace. “So the information that the 2 leaders are meeting, successful my view, is simply a bully thing. But we need, I think, to beryllium realistic."

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It is “very important for the leaders of the 2 countries to specify the narration and steer the direction," said Yu Wanli, a prof of planetary relations astatine Beijing Language and Cultural University. China volition beryllium looking for Biden to instrumentality enactment but recognizes the governmental constraints helium faces astatine home, Yu said.

If thing else, the acme whitethorn person arrested immoderate further deterioration successful ties, said Wang Huiyao, president of the Center for China and Globalization successful Beijing.

The affirmative connection sent by the 2 leaders volition “really acceptable a bully illustration for each moving levels of some governments to truly speech to each other, find the communal denominators and find each the bully points that they tin question from each other," helium said.

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