Biden administration to hold first face-to-face meet with Chinese officials next week
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The State Department said Blinken and Sullivan will meet with senior Chinese official Yang Jiechi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Anchorage in Texas on March 18
The US said on Wednesday that Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan will meet top Chinese officials next week, making this Biden administration's first face-to-face talks with its rival.
The State Department said Blinken and Sullivan will meet with senior Chinese official Yang Jiechi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Anchorage in Texas on March 18.
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It will be held after Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's visit to Asia, to strengthen partners like India, Japan, and South Korea to shores up the alliance to counter Chinese aggression.
Last week, Blinken described China as "the biggest geopolitical test of the 21st century" as it alone can "seriously challenge the stable and open international system" in a speech.
The US state secretary also vowed to put alliances first in the Washington strategy.
Also read | Why apt to counter Chinese aggression now?
US-China ties strained under the term of former president Donald Trump due to the outbreak of coronavirus.
Rights abuses in Hong Kong and China's authoritarian approach towards Tibet and Taiwan also triggered the US's anger, which led to the imposition of sanctions on several Chinese officials.
In February, US President Joe Biden spoke with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping where the former "underscored his fundamental concerns about Beijing’s coercive and unfair economic practices, crackdown in Hong Kong, human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and increasingly assertive actions in the region, including toward Taiwan."