Biden-Xi summit not likely to narrow differences on North Korea issue
These two file photos show U.S. President Joe Biden, left, speaking at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, D.C. on June 2; and Chinese President Xi Jinping speaking on arrival at Macau's international airport on Dec. 18, 2019. U.S. President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping are expected to hold a virtual summit on Nov. 15, U.S. media reported, as tensions mount over Taiwan, human rights and trade. AFP-Yonhap
By Jung Da-min
With the first virtual summit between U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping set to take place on Nov. 15, according to U.S. media reports, eyes are now on what topics will be included on the summit agenda. It will be the first virtual summit between the two leaders. The two have spoken over the phone twice since Biden took office in January.
Diplomatic experts have said that thorny issues involving the hegemonic rivalry between the two, such as the issue of Taiwan or the competition between China's Belt and Road and the U.S. and G7-led B3W (The Build Back Better World) regional initiatives to build global infrastructure in low- and middle-income countries, are expected to top the summit agenda. They have said that the North Korean nuclear issue is not a priority for the two, as they are more focused on dealing with their growing rivalry for regional hegemony.
Kang Jun-young, a professor of Chinese studies at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, has said that when relations between the Koreas, as well as those between the U.S. and North Korea, have both been in a stalemate, China could play a certain role in resolving the impasse in the denuclearization negotiations. But China has no motivation to do so, when it can instead use the North Korean nuclear issue as leverage in terms of its relations with the U.S. and South Korea, Kang added.
“China has been calling for the double suspension of North Korea's nuclear weapons tests and the joint military exercises of the U.S. and South Korea, and the simultaneous propulsion of the end-of-war declaration and the peace process on the Korean Peninsula, which is far from the U.S. stance that North Korea first needs to take preemptive denuclearization measures to make progress in the denuclearization talks,” Kang said.
He said that the U.S. and China have remained in parallel over the North Korean issue, while the latter submitted a resolution to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), together with Russia, Oct. 29, to call for an easing of sanctions on North Korea.
Kang also said while the leaders of the two rival countries intend to send a symbolic message that they are managing the risks of their growing rivalry, while their competition is affecting the political and economic security of neighboring countries, the summit is not likely to yield any notable results or agreements, with the two sides maintaining their previous stances on thorny issues.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, right, shakes hands with then-U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, now the president of the U.S., inside the Great Hall of the People in Beijing in this Dec. 4, 2013, file photo. Reuters-Yonhap
Park Won-gon, a professor of North Korean studies at Ewha Womans University, said that though both Biden and Xi are well aware that their stances on the North Korean nuclear issue are different and that the possibility for them to reach an agreement is low at the moment, they are not likely to bring the issue to the center of their discussions.
“The Biden administration is not putting emphasis on the North Korean nuclear issue, as they know all too well about the North and are aware that it is too complicated an issue to solve in a short time frame,” Park said, adding that Biden and Xi would only reaffirm their basic stance that they both want to solve the issue through diplomacy to achieve peace on the Korean Peninsula.
Referring to Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby's recent remarks during a press briefing, that China has the ability to help steer Pyongyang toward a diplomatic solution of its nuclear standoff and needs to use its influence on the North by complying with the UNSC sanctions, Park said that Washington needs to give up its wishful thinking that China could take control of North Korea.
“North Korea's core national strategy is about keeping its national sovereignty from foreign forces and China is a major foreign force against which the North has been raising its guard. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's uncle Jang Song-thaek was a symbolic figure of China's influence on the North and the execution of Jang in late 2013 is evidence of Pyongyang keeping its guard up against Beijing,” Park said.