(Beijing) China has warned the United States against supporting the Philippines in the South China Sea, as Washington pledged to back its allies in the region during a high-level meeting in Beijing on Wednesday.
“The United States should not use bilateral treaties as a pretext to undermine China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, nor should it support or condone the Philippines’ illegal actions,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan during their talks, according to Chinese broadcaster CCTV.
Joe Biden’s top adviser, for his part, “reiterated the United States’ commitment to defending its allies in the Indo-Pacific region,” according to a statement released Wednesday by the White House.
PHOTO NG HAN GUAN, PROVIDED BY REUTERS
White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan (L) and Wang Yi, director of the Office of the Communist Party Central Foreign Affairs Commission, before talks in Beijing, China, Aug. 27, 2024.
Jake Sullivan also “expressed concern over China’s destabilizing actions against lawful Philippine maritime activities in the South China Sea,” according to the report released by the US executive branch.
He also, using the now customary US language on the matter, “stressed the importance of maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.”
China and Russia
The American envoy also expressed once again America’s “concerns” over “China’s support for the Russian defense industry.”
Tensions between Beijing and Manila have escalated in recent months, marked by a series of standoffs in the South China Sea, where Beijing claims much of its islands and reefs despite a 2016 international tribunal ruling rejecting those claims.
On Monday, China announced it had taken “control measures” after a new incident with Philippine ships near a disputed atoll in the South China Sea, the fourth in a week.
According to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV, Wang told his American counterpart that China was “firmly committed to safeguarding its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights over the South China Sea islands.”
PHOTO JAM STA ROSA, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE ARCHIVES
On Monday, China announced it had taken “control measures” after a new incident with Philippine ships near a disputed atoll in the South China Sea, the fourth in a week.
Japan and the Philippines, two U.S. allies, have blamed Beijing for tensions in the South China Sea, with Tokyo calling Beijing the “biggest disrupter” of peace in Southeast Asia.
Sullivan’s trip is the first by a White House national security adviser to China since 2016.
According to Washington, it demonstrates a desire to maintain dialogue between the two superpowers, expressed in November 2023 during a meeting between Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping in California.
Military communication
The White House said the talks in Beijing were “frank, substantive and constructive.”
The United States recalled, during the talks between Jake Sullivan and Wang Yi, “the importance of having regular and continuous communications” at the military level.
The discussions focused on areas of possible cooperation between the two rival powers, in particular the fight against fentanyl trafficking and the fight against climate change.
On other more contentious issues between Washington and Beijing, the national security adviser indicated that the Biden administration would continue to make “the decisions necessary to prevent advanced American military technologies from being used in a way that compromises our national security.”
The United States has taken a series of measures limiting China’s access to certain cutting-edge technologies, much to the dismay of Beijing, which sees this as a violation of international trade rules.
Jake Sullivan finally spoke about the case of Americans “detained without reason” [en Chine] or banned from leaving the country,” stating that the subject was a “priority.”