Secretary of State Tony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan will meet with their counterparts Wang Yi and Yang Jiechi in Alaska Anchorage, Alaska next week. The meeting will be held in Alaska to allow Blinken to attend the meeting on his way back from his trip to Japan and South Korea, a department statement said. It also allows Chinese officials to give the internal impression that they are not traveling to the United States, officials said, as a visit to Washington or elsewhere in the U.S. would attract more attention, according to two people familiar with the plans.
The meeting takes place amid a deep tension in relations between the two largest economies in the world. Biden prioritized economic and military issues and mentioned potential areas of cooperation, including climate change and nuclear proliferation, while calling on China to address a number of issues related to the nefarious use of technology, trade practices and human rights abuses.
Blinken said at a congressional hearing that he will raise the Biden administration’s “many concerns” about China’s behavior.
“This is an important opportunity to expose in very frank terms the many concerns we have about Beijing’s actions and behavior that are challenging the security, prosperity and values of the United States and our partners and allies,” said Blinken during a hearing before the Chamber’s Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday afternoon.
Both the State Department and the National Security Council did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment.
On Wednesday, the State Department announced that Blinken will travel to Tokyo and Seoul for 2 + 2 discussions alongside Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin next week.
State Department spokesman Ned Price did not confirm that a meeting would take place when questioned during a department meeting on Tuesday.
“We have no meeting to announce at this time, but we know what we have to do to engage China. We know what we will do to engage China. And we have started part of that important work,” he said.
The Biden government is planning a comprehensive review of the Trump administration’s stance on China, including its crackdown on unfair trade practices and antagonistic military activities in Asia, while pursuing what it calls a robust Indo-peaceful strategy, according to with a government official. In defense matters, the Department of Defense has also established a task force focused on the US strategy towards China.
Last month, Biden spoke by phone to China’s President Xi Jinping about a number of issues and “highlighted his fundamental concerns about Beijing’s coercive and unfair economic practices, repression in Hong Kong, human rights abuses in Xinjiang and increasingly assertive actions in the region, including towards Taiwan “, according to a senior administration official.
But several questions are weighing on the relationship at the beginning of Biden’s presidency.
The Biden government endorsed a last-minute determination by the Trump administration that China committed genocide in Xinjiang, sparking fury in Beijing, which denies the accusations.
He also said that, for now, the heavy tariffs imposed on Chinese products by the Trump administration will remain.
But Biden government officials also said they found “deep problems” with the way the Trump administration approached competition with China, and it is one of the issues they are now reviewing as part of a broader Chinese policy.
Jennifer Hansler and Kylie Atwood of CNN contributed to this report.