China’s New Foreign Minister Meets US Envoy for First Time

(Bloomberg) -- Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang met US Ambassador Nicholas Burns in the highest-level meeting in weeks between the world’s biggest economies, signaling that Beijing may soon allow more senior-level discussions after rebuffing requests from the Biden administration.

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Qin asked the American envoy to serve as a “bridge” between their nations at a meeting on Monday in Beijing, according to a statement from the Chinese Foreign Ministry. “The top priority is to stabilize Sino-US relations, avoid a downward spiral, and prevent accidents between China and the United States,” he said.

High-level exchanges between China and the US have deteriorated in recent months, after an alleged Chinese spy balloon transited the US in February causing Secretary of State Antony Blinken to cancel a trip to Beijing. Since then, Beijing has stonewalled Washington’s efforts to resume top-level engagements, and the two nations remain at odds over a range of issues, including tech curbs, Taiwan, sanctions and Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Qin blamed the US for the recent flare in tensions, saying “a series of erroneous words and deeds” had undermined the positive momentum achieved after Chinese leader Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden met in Bali last November. “It’s not possible to talk about communication on the one hand, but to keep suppressing and containing China on the other hand,” Qin said.

Burns on Twitter said the two men “discussed challenges in the US-China relationship and the necessity of stabilizing ties and expanding high-level communication.” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin called the exchange a “normal diplomatic meeting” at a briefing in Beijing on Monday.

The sit down was the first between Qin and Burns since the Chinese official became foreign minister in December. It came two weeks after Burns met with diplomat Liu Jianchao, the head of the Communist Party’s International Department, which is also a ministerial-level position. That was the American envoy’s first known meeting with a senior Chinese official since mid-February.

Last week, US Climate Envoy John Kerry said Beijing invited him to visit “in the near term” for talks on averting a global climate change crisis.

--With assistance from Lucille Liu.

(Updates with statement from the US ambassador in the fifth paragraph.)

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