“More than four months now into this brutal invasion, the DPRK still stands by Russia,” Mr. Blinken, using the acronym for the People’s Republic of China, said at a press briefing after the meeting. He pointed to Beijing’s support for Moscow at the United Nations, the dissemination of Russian talking points through Chinese state media and joint military exercises with Moscow. The Biden administration wants to ensure that China, which this year signed a broad cooperation agreement with Russia amid talks of a “borderless” partnership, does not offer Moscow support in the Ukraine war. China has characterized itself as neutral in the war, but Chinese diplomats have repeatedly said Russia’s concerns about expanding the North Atlantic Treaty Organization are legitimate and said Western powers, particularly the United States, are to blame for driving Moscow into a corner.

The meeting in Bali was the latest in a recent resumption of dialogue between top US and Chinese officials.

          Photo: Stefani Reynolds/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

“I don’t think China is actually engaging in a way that suggests neutrality,” Mr. Blinken said, telling reporters that he had conveyed that concern to Mr. Wang. Mr. Blinken declined to characterize Mr. Wang’s response to Russia’s allegations. Mr. Wang did not schedule his own press conference and did not respond to reporters’ questions about whether China supports Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. US officials have sought both to pressure China to abandon support for Russia and to publicly criticize Beijing for its support of Moscow, a way of putting pressure on both governments. Mr. Wang said before meeting with Mr. Blinken that it was “important to remain committed to the principles proposed by President Xi Jinping—mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation—because this serves the interests of the two countries, two peoples”, Mr Blinken’s tough tone and the relatively cool greetings exchanged by the Chinese and US envoys came a day after Western diplomats sharply criticized Russia for helping to drive up food and energy prices in a bid to isolate Moscow in Bali. Apart from the Russia issue, Mr Blinken said he sought cooperation in a number of areas, including efforts to curb climate change. But he also said he touched on key issues that divide the countries: China’s attitude toward Taiwan, a self-governing island that Beijing claims is part of China, as well as Communist Party rule in Hong Kong, Tibet and the northwest Xinjiang region. . “We are committed to managing this relationship, this competition, responsibly – as the world expects of us – by leading the way with diplomacy,” he said. According to a readout by the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Mr Wang told Mr Blinken that if the US wanted to avoid conflict, it should stop interfering in China’s internal affairs and refrain from harming China’s interests in the name of human rights. He also took aim at what he described as rampant Sinophobia in Washington. “If this ‘threatened inflation’ is allowed to run rampant, US policy towards China will reach an impasse,” Mr Wang said, according to the reading. A senior State Department official described the five-hour meeting between Mr. Blinken and Mr. Wang as constructive and professional but also extremely frank, with neither side holding back its views on the other’s policies. Overall, US officials are willing to manage a relationship with China that they describe as highly competitive, with some room for cooperation in select areas and potential confrontation in others. Beijing has accused Washington of trying to enlist other countries in the region to undermine China’s rise, which it denounces as a revival of Cold War-style containment.

Sign up for updates

The 10-Point.

A personal, guided tour of the best saddles and stories every day in The Wall Street Journal. The Blinken-Wang meeting is at least the fifth exchange of views between senior US and Chinese officials since early June after a months-long lull in which relations already at their lowest point in decades drifted further. Both governments are looking for ways to stabilize, if not improve, ties, according to current and former officials. “There is no substitute for face-to-face — or sometimes mask to mask — diplomacy,” Mr. Blinken said before the meeting. President Biden and Chinese leader Mr. Xi are expected to speak by phone in the coming days, some of the officials said, in their first conversation since March. Mr. Biden is considering lifting some of the Trump-era tariffs on Chinese imports, a move that is likely to look favorably on Beijing. The issue of US tariffs on Chinese goods was not raised, said the senior State Department official, who declined to say whether the recent engagement could lead to a conversation between Mr Biden and Xi. Mr. Biden cannot afford another crisis, some of the current and former officials said, as his polls fall and he grapples with inflation at home and tries to keep allies united in supporting Ukraine against Russia. Meanwhile, Mr Xi is seeking a third five-year term as head of the Communist Party in a break with recent precedent and faces a slowing economy and public grumbling over coronavirus lockdowns. NATO members late last month released a new guidance document for the military alliance, singling out China for the first time and calling it a challenge to European and Atlantic security. Last week, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Christopher Wray, and Ken McCallum, director general of Britain’s internal security agency, MI5, made a rare joint appeal to businesses about the threat posed by Chinese spying on proprietary information.

SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

What is your outlook on US-China relations? Join the discussion below. Beijing hit back at the comments by Messrs Wray and McCallum, saying they exposed an “entrenched zero-sum Cold War mentality and ideological bias”. As part of the high-level meetings that resumed in early June, top US and Chinese officials discussed global security, military, trade and economic issues. For Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, her recent call with her Chinese counterpart was the first public exchange of views since October. For the chairman of the Army’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, it was the first in 18 months. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan has been meeting more regularly with his Chinese counterpart, Yang Jiechi. —Jing Yang contributed to this article. Write to William Mauldin at [email protected] and Charles Hutzler at [email protected] Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All rights reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8