TAIPEI—Senior U.S. and Chinese officials sparred over Covid-19, human rights and cybersecurity during a tense exchange Monday in the highest-level meetings between the two countries on Chinese soil since Joe Biden became president.
Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Xie Feng, meeting with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman in the port city of Tianjin on Monday, said American perceptions of China as an “imagined enemy” were responsible for a stalemate in relations between the two powers.
Ms. Sherman, who arrived in Tianjin on Sunday and also met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, laid out the reasoning behind recent tough White House action on China, according to U.S. administration officials. The purpose of the visit was to provide “guardrails” for the U.S.-China relationship to ensure it doesn’t spill over into conflict, they said.
The two sides discussed “ways to set terms for responsible management of the U.S.-China relationship,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.
Mr. Xie accused the U.S. of pushing an international order designed to benefit itself while holding back other countries, as if the U.S. introduced a “law of the jungle” where “might is right and the big bully the small,” according to a summary of his speech provided by China’s Foreign Ministry.
