BEIJING — China is willing to work with Washington to reduce global warming as long as its political demands are met, the country’s vice president told US climate envoy John Kerry on Wednesday.
Vice President Han Zheng told Kerry that addressing climate change was “an important aspect of China-US cooperation” but was based on mutual respect, the official Xinhua news agency reported. He said it should be done “on the basis of US assistance to core issues of concern to both sides, engaging and exchanging ideas.”
Ties between the countries have hit an all-time low amid disputes over tariffs, access to technology, human rights, China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea and threats against Taiwan’s self-rule .
Kerry said he had “very detailed meetings with a lot of catching up to do” during his three days of talks, following the suspension of most of China’s contacts with President Joe Biden’s administration in August past, including efforts to address global warming.
China was showing its anger over then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan, the self-governing island democracy that China claims as its own territory, to be annexed by force if necessary. Kerry, a former secretary of state and presidential candidate, said “there are a lot of things we agreed on very clearly after all this time,” but limited his comments at a news conference mainly to climate issues
The climate “doesn’t expect these things. It’s not something you can just say, okay, stop, while we’re doing something else and we’ll get back to you. It will continue,” Kerry said.
“The climate crisis is a universal threat to humanity and we all have a responsibility to address it as quickly as we can,” he said.
Kerry discussed climate issues with his Chinese counterpart, Xie Zhenhua, and told China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, on Tuesday that the Biden administration is “very committed” to stabilizing relations between the world’s two largest economies. world as countries look to restart highs. level contacts.
China has been irked by US criticism of its aggressive assertion of its claims in the South China Sea and rights abuses against Muslim and Buddhist minorities, and by US travel sanctions imposed on officials ranging from the Beijing-appointed leader of Hong Kong to the country’s defense. minister
Contacts have been restored only slowly, and China continues to refuse to restart dialogue between the People’s Liberation Army, the party’s military wing, and the US Department of Defense.
Kerry is the third senior official in the Biden administration to travel to China in recent weeks to meet with his counterparts after Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
In the latest challenge to bilateral relations, China is criticizing the upcoming stopover in the United States of Taiwan’s vice president and front-runner for next year’s presidential election, William Lai. On Wednesday, the director of the US de facto embassy in Taiwan, Sandra Oudkirk, said there was “no reason for (China) to use the transit as a pretext for any kind of provocative action. And we certainly hope that they don’t.”
The US is a key ally of Taiwan, but maintains only unofficial relations with the island in deference to Beijing.
China and the United States are the world’s two worst climate polluters and dialogue between them after a nearly year-long hiatus is seen as crucial to tackling the threat of higher temperatures and more extreme weather.
The United States and China hope for more talks on limiting the production of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases ahead of UN COP 28 negotiations in Dubai in November and December, Kerry said.
Still, tensions in the overall relationship were never far from discussions.
Kerry told Wang that he appreciated the opportunity to “change our relationship for the better” and that Biden is “very committed to stability within that relationship and also to achieving efforts together that can make a significant difference in the world”.
Biden “values his relationship with President Xi (Jinping) and I think President Xi values his relationship with President Biden, and I know he hopes to be able to move forward and change the dynamic,” Kerry said.
Kerry later paid a courtesy call on new Premier Li Qiang, the party’s second-ranking official, who told him that China and the US should cooperate more closely on the “extremely great challenge” posed by global warming .
Kerry responded that “working and showing the rest of the world how we can cooperate and begin to address this with the urgency that it requires is incredible.”
He pointed to previous agreements on reducing methane production, a major contributor to global warming, as well as transitioning from coal as an energy source and addressing deforestation.
Kerry did not meet with Xi, and Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang has been absent from public view for three weeks, with no information available from his office on his whereabouts.
China leads the world in coal production and consumption and has proceeded to build new plants that add tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere annually, while expanding the use of renewables such as solar and wind power.
The country has pledged to balance carbon dioxide emissions by 2030 and become carbon neutral by 2060, while the US and European Union have urged China to adopt more ambitious reduction targets.
As with the United States and Europe, China has experienced periods of record high temperatures this summer that have threatened crops and prompted cities to open Cold War-era air raid shelters to help residents escape the heat.
US lawmakers have criticized China for insisting it is still a developing economy that produces far less pollution per capita and should be exempt from the stricter climate standards adopted by developed Western economies.
Thom Woodroofe, a senior fellow at the Asia Society’s China Climate Hub and a former climate diplomat, said in an email that Kerry’s visit was a “small victory for the stabilization of the US-China relationship.”
“The door is clearly open for more engagement on climate and the optics bode well for future rounds of discussion,” Woodroofe said.
