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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Beijing this week to meet with senior Chinese officials, the State Department announced Wednesday.
The visit was originally slated for earlier this year but postponed after a reconnaissance balloon linked to China was discovered lingering over US airspace.
The top US diplomat will “raise bilateral issues of concern, global and regional matters, and potential cooperation on shared transnational challenges,” US State Department said in a statement.
The trip follows a phone call between Blinken and China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang earlier on the day.
Since the beginning of the year, China-US relations have encountered new difficulties and challenges, with responsibility clear, Qin said.
The US should respect China’s core concerns including the Taiwan issue, and stop interfering in China’s internal affairs and undermining China’s sovereignty, security and development interests in the name of competition, he said.
China hopes the US will take practical action to implement the consensus reached by the two countries’ leaders at Bali meeting, meet China halfway, effectively manage differences, promote exchanges and cooperation, and promote the stabilization of China-US relations and bring the bilateral relations back to a healthy and stable track, Qin said.