Xi-Biden three-hour virtual meeting

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{Good evening.}

U.S. President Joe Biden and President Xi Jinping had a candid three-hour virtual meeting this morning Hong Kong time.

While both countries are stuck between a rock and a hard place, Joe Biden expressed his wish of steering clear of a conflict as the two countries continue to jostle for more things.

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No reporters waiting on bated breath and pins and needles this time and privy to the inside scoop on the meeting, as the heads of the world's two major superpowers had a virtual meeting this morning.

U.S. President Joe Biden began the meeting by saying both countries should be striving for a level playing field and doubling down on efforts to ensure the competition does not culminate in a serious conflict.

Joe Biden, U.S. President: As I've said before, it seems to me our responsibility as leaders of China and the United States is to ensure that the competition between our countries does not veer into conflict, whether intended or unintended. Just simple, straightforward competition.

The few words the White House mustered were, they don't expect a lot. And the two leaders didn't even make a joint statement of substance.

President Xi greeted the U.S. President as his "old friend", and echoed Biden's cordial tone as he delivered a few well-chosen words, adding more and enhanced communication and cooperation between the two countries are needed.

Tensions between the two countries are not incipient, and both leaders made no secret of it.

Since Biden was inaugurated back in January, he quickly took aim at Beijing for human rights abuses in Xinjiang, suppressing democratic movements in Hong Kong, and being more and more assertive in the Taiwan Strait. Beijing, meanwhile, hit back, saying the United States will soon be hoisted by its own petard being that it's been making a takeover bid for Taiwan.

Be that as it may, the two leaders are not letting any conflict encumber their joint effort to tamp down tensions.

Issues pertaining to the increasingly renegade island of Taiwan were obviously front-and-centre in the virtual meeting, which lasted more than 3 hours. Tensions have heightened ever since the Chinese military dispatched an increasing number of fighter jets near the self-ruled island, which Beijing considers part of its territory.

Meantime, notwithstanding conjecture that efforts to tamp down simmering tensions appear to be coming apart at the seams, the White House reiterated today that the Biden administration will hold fast to the longstanding U.S. "One China" policy. However, Biden warned of swift action, should there be any unilateral efforts to debauch the status quo across the Taiwan Strait.

Suffice it to say, cooperation on climate change might be something in China's interest, as both countries are dedicated to ensuring cooperation between the two countries will not bite the dust and preventing getting embroiled in yet another imbroglio.