WOODSIDE, Calif., Nov. 15 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden said on Wednesday he had not changed his view that Chinese President Xi Jinping is a de facto dictator, and the two leaders agreed to have a candid summit. This statement is likely to come as a shock to Beijing. I talk.
Mr. Biden held a solo press conference after holding a four-hour meeting with Mr. Xi on the outskirts of San Francisco. At the end of the press conference, he was asked whether he still held the view that President Xi was a dictator, as he had said in June.
“Look, he is. He’s a dictator in the sense that he runs a communist country based on a completely different form of government than ours,” Biden said.
In response, China’s Foreign Ministry said it “strongly opposes” the remarks, without mentioning Biden by name.
“This statement is extremely wrong and an irresponsible political maneuver,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told reporters at a regular briefing on Thursday.
U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Filloli Residence on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in Woodside, California, U.S., November 15, 2023.Reuters/Kevin Lamarque Obtaining license rights
“It must be pointed out that there will always be people with ulterior motives who want to instigate and damage U.S.-China relations. They are doomed to fail.”
Mao Zedong refused to reveal the identities of “some people” in response to further questions.
In March last year, in an election in which there were no other candidates, approximately 3,000 members of the National People’s Congress, China’s rubber-stamp parliament, unanimously voted for Mr. Xi, winning him a third term as president. was confirmed.
Mr. Xi is considered the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong after a decade of consolidating policymaking and military power and suppressing press freedom.
There was no immediate response from the Chinese delegation, which was in the United States to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference in San Francisco.Hundreds of Beijing critics marched through the city’s downtown Around noon, they chanted “Free Tibet” and “Free Hong Kong.”
When Biden mentioned similar dictators in June, China called the remarks ridiculous and a provocation. But the spat did not prevent the two countries from holding wide-ranging talks aimed at improving strained relations, culminating in talks on Wednesday.
Written by Steve Holland. Additional reporting by Laurie Chen in Beijing.Editing: Heather Timmons, Stephen Coates, Raju Gopalakrishnan
Our standards: Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
