US Secretary of State Antony Blinken with US Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns and US Consulate-General Scott Walker in Shanghai on April 24.
But Washington and Beijing have made little headway on curbing China’s supply of chemicals used to make fentanyl, the South China Sea remains a flashpoint, and strains are growing over China’s backing of Russia inState Department spokesman Matthew Miller said that at a meeting with China’s top official in Shanghai, Mr Chen Jining, Mr Blinken raised concerns about China’s “trade policies and non-market economic practices”.
While in Shanghai, Mr Blinken also spoke with American and Chinese students at New York University’s local campus, where he said intercultural interactions were “the best way to make sure that we start by hopefully understanding one another”. Mr Blinken also attended a basketball game and dined at a steamed bun restaurant on April 24 night with US Ambassador Nicholas Burns, underscoring the importance to the US of rebuilding personal connections with the Chinese people.
Mr Biden also signed a separate bill tied to the aid legislation that bans TikTok in the US. if its owner, the Chinese tech firm ByteDance, fails to divest the popular short video app over the next nine months to a year. Without providing details, a senior State Department official told reporters that Washington was prepared to “take steps” against Chinese firms it believes are damaging US and European security.