The Irish Times view on China’s new diplomatic moves

Xi Jinping’s meeting with Joe Biden was the signal moment in a week of intense diplomatic activity that saw the Chinese president return to the world stage after a three-year absence. His meeting with Biden saw the two leaders seek to put guardrails on the competition between the United States and China and to prevent a downward spiral into conflict.

Biden and Xi disagree as keenly as ever on the issues of Taiwan, human rights and fair trade competition after their three-hour meeting on the Indonesian island of Bali. And China and the US remain strategic, economic and technological competitors, driven by sharply different ideologies.

However, after months of sabre-rattling, the two leaders promised further engagement and offered mutually reassuring clarifications. Biden said that the US was not seeking a new Cold War or to change China’s system and was not trying to contain China or halt its development. He said Washington does not support Taiwan’s independence, remains committed to the One China policy and is not looking for a conflict with China. Xi told Biden that China is not trying to change the existing international order and has no intention to challenge or displace the US.

These reassurances were restatements of existing policies but they were significant corrections to loose talk and reckless actions on both sides. In the world of nuclear-armed, great power rivalry, strategic ambiguity can be useful but unpredictability and misunderstanding are dangerous.

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Xi’s meetings with European leaders, notably French president Emmanuel Macron, also helped to dial down tensions without resolving any major disagreements. But Macron said that China could play a useful role in putting pressure on Russia to end the war in Ukraine.

Xi has refused to condemn Russia’s invasion. But his support for Putin has had clear limits, so that China has not supplied Russia with arms or breached western sanctions and Xi has warned against nuclear threats in Ukraine. If Xi’s meetings with Biden and other leaders help to turn down the temperature over China in some western capitals, that will be welcome.

But there are steps Beijing could take that would help to rebuild confidence, particularly in Europe. It should drop its effective trade boycott against Lithuania over the naming of a representative office from Taiwan in Vilnius and lift sanctions it imposed on European politicians who have criticised Beijing’s human rights record. It should allow European companies to operate in the Chinese market under fairer conditions.

China, the United States and the European Union need to work together if they are to address the world’s biggest problems, such as climate change and food security. Xi’s meetings last week are welcome steps on a path to deeper engagement that is in the interest of all sides.