Glasgow: The United States President Joe Biden said he was not worried about an armed conflict with China and told Beijing that Washington was not going to change its attitude toward what constitutes international airspace, international sea lanes, et cetera.
Responding to a question during a press conference here on November 2, 2021, (local time) on how he assessed of where things stood between China and the USA in the wake of the Chinese military testing a hypersonic missile, Biden said he had made it clear to the Chinese President Xi Jinping that “this is competition; it does not have to be conflict. There is no reason there needs to be conflict”.
Biden also said that he had made it clear that they have to work on dealing with things like cybersecurity and a whole range of other issues. “But I — I’m not looking for, I don’t anticipate there will be a need for — to be — there be physical conflict. But, you know, as you’ve heard me say this before — my dad had an expression. He’d say, “The only conflict worse than the one that’s intended is one that’s unintended” — one that’s unintended.”
The US President said he has had “hours of conversations” with Jinping, both in person when he was Vice President and since he has been President, “at least five or six hours’ worth of conversations on the telephone”.
“And so, in my meetings with him virtually coming up — we haven’t set the exact date yet — I want to make sure there’s no misunderstanding. It’s competition, not conflict. And so, there’s no — no unintended,” he said.
He disclosed that he had also indicated to Jinping that “we expect him to play by the rules of the road”.
– global bihari bureau
