Top diplomats of the U.S. and China have held their first talks following the recent crisis in relations over the shooting down of a Chinese “spy balloon”, with both sides trading accusations over the incident.
Meeting on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference this past weekend, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who cancelled a highly anticipated trip to China over the balloon, met with Chinese Politburo member and Director of the Central Foreign Affairs Commission Wang Yi.
Mr. Blinken “directly spoke to the unacceptable violation of U.S. sovereignty and international law by the PRC high-altitude surveillance balloon in U.S. territorial airspace, underscoring that this irresponsible act must never again occur”, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said.
“The Secretary made clear the United States will not stand for any violation of our sovereignty, and that the PRC’s high altitude surveillance balloon program — which has intruded into the air space of over 40 countries across 5 continents —has been exposed to the world.”
The Chinese Foreign Ministry, which pointed out that Mr. Blinken had sought the meeting, in a statement said Mr. Wang had conveyed China’s “strong position” that “what the U.S. side has done was apparently an abuse of the use of force and violation of customary international practice and the International Civil Aviation Covenant.”
“China deplores it and strongly protests it,” he said. “It is the U.S. who is in fact the number one country in terms of surveillance, whose high-altitude balloons illegally flew over China multiple times.”
Warning of the consequences to relations, Mr. Wang said the U.S. “needs to…demonstrate sincerity, and acknowledge and resolve the damage its abuse of force has done to China-U.S. relations.”
“If the U.S. side continues to fuss over, dramatise and escalate the unintended and isolated incident, it should not expect the Chinese side to flinch. The U.S. side should be prepared to bear all consequence arising from an escalation,” he warned.
The comments underlined how already tense relations have been further derailed by the balloon incident, which has halted a nascent effort by both sides to manage their ties, as agreed last year by Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping. Mr. Blinken’s now cancelled visit had been planned as the first high-level engagement as part of that effort.
Mr. Blinken said the U.S. “will compete and will unapologetically stand up for our values and interests, but that we do not want conflict with the PRC and are not looking for a new Cold War.” Mr. Wang, for his part, reminded the U.S. of its commitments on the Taiwan issue calling for it to “follow through on its statement of ‘not supporting Taiwan independence’”.
Both sides also differed on the Ukraine crisis, and Mr. Blinken had “warned about the implications and consequences if China provides material support to Russia or assistance with systemic sanctions evasion.”
Mr. Wang rejected the warning, saying China “does not accept the U.S.’s finger-pointing or even coercion targeting China-Russia relations.”
