Beijing/Washington, (EFE).- The US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, arrived in China this Sunday morning, becoming the highest-ranking US official to visit the Asian giant since the president of the North American country, Joe Biden, began his term in 2021.
After a year of tensions between the two powers, experts wonder if Blinken’s visit will calm things down and put the bilateral relationship on track, or if, on the contrary, the disagreements between Washington and Beijing have reached a point of no return.
In fact, the secretary had planned to visit China last February, but the downing of an alleged Chinese spy balloon over US territory caused the visit to be canceled at the last moment.
This Saturday, the same US president, Joe Biden, considered the balloon crisis over, assuring that the device was not sent “intentionally”.
Ukraine and Taiwan
Before leaving, Blinken said at a press conference on Friday that his goal is to establish “stable communication channels” between the US and China to avoid “misunderstandings” between the two powers that could lead to a conflict.
The State Department has detailed that Blinken also wants to put on the table the situation in Taiwan, the war in Ukraine, fentanyl trafficking and the release of US prisoners in China.
For his part, the spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Wang Wenbin, has assured in recent days that this visit will address issues of mutual concern” and in the face of which the Asian country “will firmly protect its own interests.”
Biden announces a meeting with Xi Jinping
According to the director of the Institute of American Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Yuan Zheng, “despite the fact that relations between the US and China were seriously deteriorated after the balloon incident”, there have been “symptoms of a thaw” in the months and a “greater high-level engagement” between the two powers.
Proof of this is that Biden said this Saturday that he hopes to meet with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, in the coming months to address the points of friction between the two powers.