(Headline USA) Secretary of State Antony Blinken appeared to visibly wince during the Asia–Pacific Economic Cooperation conference on Wednesday when President Joe Biden referred to Chinese President Xi Jinping as a “dictator.”
Video footage showed Blinken recoiling and shaking his head after Biden, during his address, said Xi “is a dictator in the sense that he is the guy who runs the country that is a communist country … based on a form of government different than ours.”
The remark came just hours after Biden met with Xi in San Francisco ahead of the address—the two leaders’ first in-person sit-down in a year.
Blinken reportedly has been trying to mend ties with Xi’s ties after Biden referred to Xi as a dictator back in June, prompting a harsh rebuke from the Chinese government.
Publicly, however, he stood behind Biden, saying that the president “speaks candidly, he speaks clearly.”
Xi’s government similarly blasted Biden this week following the comment, saying China “strongly opposes” the dictator description.
“This statement is extremely wrong and irresponsible political manipulation,” said Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for China’s foreign ministry, in a statement without mentioning Biden by name. “It should be pointed out that there will always be some people with ulterior motives who attempt to incite and damage U.S.–China relations, they are doomed to fail.”
However, Biden doubled down on the characterization when asked whether he stands by the remark on Thursday.
“Well, look, he is,” Biden said of Xi.
The rest of the APEC conference focused on easing tensions between the U.S. and China, with Xi insisting that the U.S. cannot decouple its economy from China’s without serious consequences.
Biden also vowed not to let the ongoing tensions “veer into conflict,” though it is not clear whether he addressed China’s increasing military aggression toward the U.S.
“I value our conversation because I think it’s paramount that you and I understand each other clearly, leader to leader, with no misconceptions or miscommunication,” Biden told Xi.
