US official: CIA chief made secret journey to China amid tensions | Politics information

In an effort to enhance communications between Beijing and Washington, the director of the CIA, William Burns, visited China final month for talks together with his Chinese language counterparts, a US official mentioned.

Burns’ go to in Might, first reported by the Monetary Instances, comes as Washington tries to calm tensions with Beijing and restore strains of communication amid fears that miscommunication between the 2 world powers may by chance spiral into battle.

Information of the go to to China comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration has pressed to revive contact and schedule conferences between varied senior officers in Washington and Beijing.

“Final month, Director Burns traveled to Beijing, the place he met together with his Chinese language counterparts and emphasised the significance of sustaining open strains of communication in intelligence channels,” a US official advised Reuters information company on Friday.

Burns met with Chinese language intelligence officers and never any of Beijing’s overseas or political management, in line with a second particular person acquainted with the go to who additionally spoke on situation of anonymity.

The CIA, which doesn’t frequently publicize such visits, declined to touch upon stories of Burns’ journey to China.

Relations between Beijing and Washington have come underneath extreme pressure in latest months over points starting from the human rights report of Taiwan and China to Beijing’s rising navy exercise within the South China Sea and shut ties with Russia.

Washington accuses China of contemplating offering navy assist to Moscow to help its invasion of Ukraine. China denied these allegations.

Some critics of the Biden administration have questioned the worth of Washington’s overtures to Beijing, saying many years of engagement have failed to vary China’s strategy to a spread of points, together with commerce, safety and human rights.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has postponed a visit to China in February amid a diplomatic storm after an alleged Chinese language spy balloon was shot down over US airspace and over delicate navy websites.

On Friday, US Protection Secretary Lloyd Austin additionally shook arms with Chinese language Nationwide Protection Minister Li Changfu on the sidelines of a safety summit in Singapore, however there was no “substantive trade,” the Pentagon mentioned.

China earlier refused to carry an official assembly between Austin and Lee, who’s topic to US sanctions, throughout the Shangri-La Safety Summit, which might be held within the subsequent few days.

In 2018, Washington imposed sanctions on the Gear Improvement Division (EED) of the Chinese language Ministry of Protection, and its then director Li, for buying missiles and fight plane from Russia.

The sanctions led to a US visa ban and banned the European Endowment for Democracy and Lee from conducting transactions with the US monetary system.

Talking on the summit on Saturday, Austin mentioned dialogue between the US and China is “important” and can assist keep away from miscalculations that would result in battle.

The US believes that strains of communication are open with the Individuals’s Republic of China [PRC] Austin mentioned in remarks on the summit.

“The extra we speak, the extra we are able to keep away from misunderstandings and miscalculations that would result in disaster or battle,” he mentioned.

Individually, White Home Nationwide Safety Adviser Jake Sullivan mentioned on Friday that the US needs to have interaction with China “with out preconditions” on nuclear arms management points, however that Beijing remains to be unwilling to take action.

“Merely put, we now have not but seen a PRC willingness to separate strategic stability from the broader points within the relationship,” Sullivan mentioned in a speech to the Arms Management Affiliation, noting that this has been a bedrock of nuclear and strategic safety for many years.

“That’s the reason we’re additionally keen to have interaction China with out preconditions, which helps be certain that competitors is managed, and that competitors doesn’t deviate into battle,” he mentioned.

“We’ll see what the Individuals’s Republic of China chooses,” he added.