Joe Biden met Chinese President Xi Jinping for the last time as U.S. president on November 16, with the leaders' goal of lowering tensions before Donald Trump's inauguration challenged by fresh conflicts over cybercrime, trade, Taiwan, and Russia.
Biden and Xi huddled on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Lima, Peru as they began their first talks in seven months, according to Chinese state media. Washington is incensed by a recent China-linked hack of the telephone communications of U.S.
government and presidential campaign officials, and it is anxious about increasing pressure by Beijing on Taiwan and Chinese support for Russia. Taiwan President Lai Ching-te is planning to stop in the U.S.
state of Hawaii and maybe Guam on a sensitive visit that is sure to anger Beijing in the coming weeks. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on November 16 that there remains a "limited opportunity" for nuclear negotiations with the West, according to Iranian state media. Relations between Tehran and the United States have been especially tense since then-President Donald Trump withdrew unilaterally from a 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and global powers and reimposed tough U.
S. sanctions on Iran. "There is still an opportunity for diplomacy, although this opportunity is not much.
It is a limited opportunity," Araqchi was quoted as telling state television. Western concerns at Iranian actions have soared amid the yearlong war in the Gaza Strip after U.S.
- a.