Stressing diplomacy, Biden says not seeking conflict with China, Russia
WASHINGTON, United States — US President Joe Biden said Wednesday he was not seeking conflict with China or Russia as he put a renewed focus on diplomacy in his first address to Congress.
In a speech focused on selling major investments at home, Biden told lawmakers who months earlier had dodged a deadly insurrection that they needed to show democracy can work.
"We're in a competition with China and other countries to win the 21st century," Biden said, warning: "Autocrats think democracies can't compete."
Biden said he told President Xi Jinping in a two-hour first phone conversation after taking office: "We welcome the competition — and that we are not looking for conflict."
"But I made absolutely clear that we will defend America's interests across the board," he said.
"America will stand up to unfair trade practices that undercut American workers and industries, like subsidies for state-owned enterprises and the theft of American technologies and intellectual property," he said.
"I also told President Xi that we will maintain a strong military presence in the Indo-Pacific just as we do with NATO in Europe — not to start a conflict but to prevent one," Biden said to applause from an unusually small audience due to Covid restrictions.
In an aside that was not in prepared remarks, Biden noted his extensive dealings with Xi when both were vice presidents — and warned that China's most powerful leader in years had firm plans for the future.
"He's deadly earnest on becoming the most significant, consequential nation in the world," Biden said.
Tensions have sharply risen with China over the past few years as the United States also take issue with China's assertive military moves and human rights concerns, including what Washington has described as genocide against the mostly Muslim Uyghur minority.
Focus on cooperation
The speech marked a shift from the hawkish nationalism of his predecessor Donald Trump, with Biden repeatedly speaking of global cooperation.
"There is no wall high enough to keep the virus out," Biden said, alluding to Trump's cherished wall on the Mexican border.
Similar to his message on China, Biden said he did not seek worse relations with Russia.
In his first three months in office, Biden has imposed sanctions over Russia's purported poisoning of ailing dissident Alexei Navalny and over its alleged interference in US elections and hacking operations.
But Biden has also proposed a summit in a third country with President Vladimir Putin to bring stability to relations and pointed in his speech to cooperation on climate change and the extension of New START, the last Cold war nuclear reduction treaty.
"I made very clear to Putin that we are not going to seek escalation but their actions will have consequences," Biden said.
Flipping the language of George W. Bush when used the same platform nearly two decades ago to assail an "axis of evil," Biden vowed diplomacy on the "serious threat" of the nuclear programs of both Iran and North Korea.
"We'll be working closely with our allies to address the threats posed by both of these countries through diplomacy and stern deterrence,'" Biden said.
The United States is holding indirect talks with Iran in Vienna in a bid to re-enter a denuclearization accord trashed by Trump.
The Biden administration is separately reviewing policy on North Korea after Trump's unusually personal diplomacy that included three meetings with leader Kim Jong Un.
Vowing to exert US leadership, Biden also said he was reasserting US priorities by ending "the forever war" in Afghanistan — where he is pulling out remaining troops after 20 years.
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On a frigid but sunny day at the very Capitol building that was assaulted on January 6, Biden was sworn in moments after Kamala Harris became America's first woman vice president, closing the book on Donald Trump's tumultuous four years.
"Democracy is precious, democracy is fragile and at this hour, my friends, democracy has prevailed," Biden says before a National Mall that was virtually empty due to the ultra-tight security and a raging COVID-19 pandemic that he vowed to confront immediately. — AFP
US President Joe Biden on Thursday defends plans to extend the border wall with Mexico, saying he didn't think such barriers worked but that he was bound by laws introduced under Donald Trump.
Democrat Biden pledged during his White House race with Trump in 2020 that he would abandon the Republican's signature policy and would not build any more of the wall. — AFP
President Joe Biden admits he was concerned that US political turmoil could disrupt wartime aid for Ukraine, but says he would soon give a major speech to convince doubters on backing Kyiv.
"It does worry me," Biden says when asked whether the ousting of Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy by hardliners in his own party could derail more funds for Ukraine's war effort.
"But I know there are a majority of members of the House and Senate of both parties who have said that they support funding Ukraine," he tells reporters at the White House. — AFP
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has requested a bilateral meeting with his US counterpart to discuss the migration crisis that has "overwhelmed" his country, his foreign minister says.
The meeting would occur in Washington when Lopez Obrador attends a summit of Latin American leaders, to be convened by US President Joe Biden on November 3.
Lopez Obrador wants to discuss "legal paths" to address the humanitarian situation facing hundreds of thousands of people who have recently attempted to make their way to the United States and to study the ways in which they can request asylum, as well as work visas for the agricultural sector. — AFP
The US auto workers union expands a strike against two of Detroit's "Big Three", while President Joe Biden announces plans to join the picket line in solidarity with employees.
Some 5,600 members of the United Auto Workers union walked out of 38 US parts and distribution centers at General Motors and Stellantis at noon Friday, adding to last week's dramatic worker walkout.
The UAW has described its campaign as an effort to level the economic playing field for the working class, but Friday's events also underscored the lofty political stakes, with Biden's visit coming just a day before a planned trip by Republican rival Donald Trump. — AFP
US President Joe Biden leads international calls of solidarity with Iranians one year after Mahsa Amini's death sparked mass protests, with Western powers unveiling a series of new sanctions.
The anniversary of Amini's death in the custody of the clerical state's morality police comes as some activists criticize what they see as a return to business as usual with Tehran, which was already under a slew of sanctions.
Biden says in a statement that "today -- as we remember Mahsa's tragic death -- we reaffirm our commitment to the courageous people of Iran who are carrying on her mission." — AFP
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