Blinken Engages China’s Top Diplomat on Ukraine, Preparing Path for Biden-Xi Meeting

Secretary of State Antony Blinken speaks to reporters at Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., on Oct. 17, 2022. Josh Edelson/AFP/Getty Images

Senior officials from China and the United States held a phone call over the weekend in which they discussed the ongoing war in Ukraine, as well as trade and international security. The call could be an attempt to prepare the way for an anticipated meeting next month of the two nations’ leaders.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi during an Oct. 30 call. Wang was promoted to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) Politburo earlier in the month, making him China’s top-ranking diplomat.

“The Secretary discussed the need to maintain open lines of communication and responsibly manage the U.S.-PRC relationship,” said State Department Spokesperson Ned Price in a statement, using an acronym for communist China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.

“The Secretary raised Russia’s war against Ukraine and the threats it poses to global security and economic stability.”

U.S. leadership previously accused the CCP, which rules China as a single-party state, of tacitly supporting Russia’s war of conquest.

CCP leadership is reported to have known about the invasion of Ukraine at least a month in advance, and to have requested that Russian leader Vladimir Putin postpone the war until the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics had concluded. The CCP also censored critical views of the war expressed online and has continuously criticized the multilateral sanctions against Russia as being a violation of Russia’s sovereignty.

In March, U.S. leadership met for a seven-hour meeting with CCP representatives following reports that the regime was considering providing economic and military assistance for Russia’s war effort. The face-to-face also followed one report which found China-based actors had launched a large cyber campaign the day before the invasion designed to cripple Ukrainian civilian and military infrastructure.

While the State Department’s readout said that Blinken and Wang discussed the problems that the war in Ukraine could bring to bear on global security and economic stability, however, the Chinese readout of the phone call only placed mention of Ukraine in the final paragraph.

Instead of focusing on Ukraine, the CCP’s version of the phone call decried the United States’ recent efforts to curb the regime’s access to semiconductor chips required for advanced weapons systems, and vowed that the ideology of communism must be adhered to.

The “progress of mankind,” Wang said, would rely on “Chinese-style modernization” and adherence to “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.”

Despite the strong language, however, Wang said that the call was a “positive gesture,” and that Blinken had expressed the United States’ willingness to maintain communication and engage in cooperation with China.

The call is likely to be seen as a testing of the waters between the two powers. President Joe Biden is expected to meet with CCP leader Xi Jinping in November during the G20 summit in Indonesia. Neither side has confirmed the details of the meeting, which would be the pair’s first face-to-face encounter during the Biden presidency. Both sides’ mention of being willing to communicate on some issues could signal that the planning of that meeting is indeed a go.