With US-China relations on a tightrope, Biden and Xi’s rendezvous is more important than ever
It has been a year since President Xi and President Biden last met, and it’s hard to overstate just what a rollercoaster US-China relations have been on since then.
The fact this meeting is happening at all is the result of months of delicate planning.
But for all the “tough-line”, “hard-man” images that both men try to broadcast domestically, there is a mutual recognition of one key fact: it would cost more, both politically and economically, to allow relations to spiral.
Why now?
It was just nine months ago that US-China relations hit what felt like rock bottom as the so-called Chinese spy balloon was shot down over the US, plunging their diplomacy into crisis.
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Moment ‘spy balloon’ is shot down
The vast backdrop of disagreements from Taiwan, the Indo-Pacific, the Ukraine war, tech controls and economic sanctions meant the relationship felt as precarious and as dangerous as it had in decades.
But the summer has seen a blitz of diplomatic efforts to try to repair things, with multiple meetings of officials at various levels.
Both sides know the window for progress is narrow.
Come next year, Taiwan’s presidential election will likely inflame tensions, and then the inevitable anti-China sentiment that will accompany the US election cycle will no doubt make things worse.
The time to play statesmen and to push for their interests is now!
What do they want?
Don’t be under any illusion, both Biden and Xi are coming to this table with immense amounts of scepticism about the other’s intentions.
Any meaningful breakthrough is highly unlikely.
What they both seek is a degree of what’s being called “tactical stabilisation” – a pause in deterioration that will allow each to pursue its interests in a more predictable environment.
On the US side, there is an understanding that only a meeting of the top men will unlock the Chinese system to enable cooperation on some of the “easier” issues like climate change and global health.
There is also a hope that military-to-military talks might be able to restart after being shut down following former Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s controversial visit to Taiwan last year.
From China’s perspective, a pause in deterioration gives it the space to continue to build up its economic and military strength to better compete going forward.
The visuals are also important to Xi Jinping domestically.
It has not been a brilliant year for him, with a chaotic end to his hated zero COVID policy, a faltering economy and deteriorating relations with multiple western countries. Being seen to be able to manage this crucial relationship is important to casting himself as a competent statesman.
So what will they discuss?
There are so many disagreements likely to be raised, but these are the top three on the list:
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China and US meet to ease tensions
Territorial claims and military tension
Perhaps top of the long list of issues between them is China’s increasingly assertive behaviour in contested areas that it claims as its own.
Most prominent is Taiwan, the self-governing island that China sees as a breakaway province. Xi has expressed multiple times his desire to “reunify” Taiwan, Biden has promised to defend it.
The other arena where tensions are rising is the South China Sea.
China claims the vast majority as its international waters, despite rival claims from the Philippines and others. In 2016, an international arbitral tribunal ruled overwhelmingly in favour of the Philippines.
However, in recent months there have been frequent confrontations between Chinese and Filipino vessels, and here too the US has reiterated its commitment to support the Philippines.
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Boats from China and Philippines collide
The US claims that in both areas China’s behaviour is becoming increasingly aggressive and, in some cases dangerous. It has released videos of Chinese jets flying hair-raisingly close to US ones, in one recent case, just 10ft away.
The Americans say the risk of accidents and escalation is grave.
China, for its part, says that it is US conduct that is the dangerous force. It sees American presence in these regions as blatant provocation in its backyard.
These are deeply intractable issues, the best that might be hoped for is some sort of agreement to an offramp for if things ever escalate.
Global conflicts
The two leaders will also discuss the two major ongoing global conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.
In both, they have taken a drastically different tact.
When it comes to Ukraine, China has attempted to portray itself as a neutral peacemaker, one of the only nations with the ability to talk to both sides.
The reality, though, is that Xi has made no secret of his growing closeness to Putin and has quietly been providing Russia with finance, technology and diplomatic cover.
Xi has made no secret of his growing closeness to Putin. Pic: AP
Meanwhile, in the Middle East, it has called for a ceasefire and peace, but it has stopped short of directly condemning Hamas for the 7 October atrocities and state media has taken a decidedly pro-Palestinian tone.
In both cases, China’s approach is in stark opposition to America’s, and it has criticised its rival for its full-throated support for both Israel and Ukraine and the supply of military assistance.
At root, both have an interest in the other not gaining advantage or influence off the back of the outcomes of these conflicts.
Tech and economic sanctions
There is still a raft of restrictions on technology and economic sanctions that exist between them.
Just in the last month, new ones have been announced on both sides, with China restricting US access to graphite (a crucial component in making batteries) and the US further restricting Chinese access to semiconductors.
The aim on both sides is to hinder the other’s ability to develop in key areas such as AI. But this trade war hurts them both as they remain major trading partners and the two economies are highly reliant on each other.
Xi in particular has a need to mitigate these issues.
Amidst a flagging economy, he is trying to woo foreign investment back to China and is expected to meet with US business leaders while in San Francisco.
A smooth summit might help him stave off, at least temporarily, more US restrictions and it may help shore up the confidence of some foreign businesses spooked by the imposition of state-centric restrictions and raids on a handful of China-based US businesses.
US
Democrat Cory Booker rails against Donald Trump and Elon Musk during marathon Senate speech lasting more than 17 hours
A senior Democrat has taken to the Senate floor to speak against US President Donald Trump – with the 17-plus-hour speech still ongoing.
Cory Booker, a New Jersey senator, began speaking around 7pm (midnight in the UK) and said he intended to disrupt the “normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able”.
Referring to Mr Trump’s presidency, he said: “I rise tonight because I believe sincerely that our country is in crisis.”
As of 5pm in the UK, Mr Booker was still speaking, having spoken for more than 17 hours. He has remained standing for the entire duration, as he would lose control of the floor if he left his desk or sat down.
Read more: Who is the Democrat making a marathon speech against Trump?
As of 4pm, Cory Booker has held the Senate floor for more than 16 hours. Pic: Senate Television / AP
Other Democrat senators have joined Mr Booker to ask questions so he can rest his voice, including Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer.
At the start of his speech, Mr Booker said: “These are not normal times in our nation. And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate.
“The threats to the American people and American democracy are grave and urgent, and we all must do more to stand against them.”
Overnight, he referenced Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, who filibustered for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957.
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Prosecutors directed to seek death penalty for Luigi Mangione
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“You think we got civil rights one day because Strom Thurmond – after filibustering for 24 hours – you think we got civil rights because he came to the floor one day and said ‘I’ve seen the light’,” he said.
“No, we got civil rights because people marched for it, sweat for it and [civil rights leader] John Lewis bled for it.”
Only Mr Thurmond and Republican Senator Ted Cruz – who spoke for 21 hours and 19 minutes against the Affordable Care Act in 2013 – have held the Senate floor for longer than Mr Booker.
Luigi Mangione could face the death penalty over the killing of UnitedHealthcare boss Brian Thompson.
The 26-year-old has pleaded not guilty to New York state charges of murder as an act of terrorism and weapons offenses.
New York does not have the death penalty for state charges, and so he could face life in prison without parole if convicted in that case.
But he also faces federal charges over Mr Thompson’s killing – and US attorney general Pamela Bondi has directed federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty.
Mangione has not yet been asked to enter a plea to the federal charges.
Here’s what we know about him.
Wealth, private school and Ivy League education
Mangione was born and raised in Maryland and has links to San Francisco and Hawaii.
His social media lists him as being from Towson, a well-to-do area to the north of the city of Baltimore.
He is the grandson of a wealthy property developer and philanthropist and the cousin of a current Maryland state legislator.
He attended Gilman School – a private all-boys school in Baltimore. The school’s annual fees are up to $37,690 (around £29,000) and it boasts alumni including NFL stars and former senators.
After graduating in 2016, Mangione went to the University of Pennsylvania, one of America’s elite Ivy League schools.
According to his social media, he studied computer science and launched a group named UPGRADE (UPenn Game Research and Development Environment).
A university spokesperson said he earned undergraduate and graduate degrees there.
He later co-founded his own computer game company, which focused on small, simplistic games.
Mangione went to a prestigious Ivy League university. Pic: LinkedIn
‘No complaints – a great guy’
According to his LinkedIn page, Mangione moved to California in 2020 and worked for the car-buying website TrueCar. The firm’s boss said he left last year.
Mangione currently lists himself as from Honolulu on LinkedIn, with pictures on Instagram showing him on the Hawaiian island.
In the first half of 2022, he reportedly lived at Surfbreak, a co-living space aimed at remote workers in Honolulu’s Waikiki neighbourhood.
“Luigi was just widely considered to be a great guy. There were no complaints,” Josiah Ryan, a spokesperson for Surfbreak’s owner, told the AP news agency.
“There was no sign that might point to these alleged crimes they’re saying he committed.”
Mr Ryan said Mangione left to get surgery on the US mainland for chronic back pain he suffered from since childhood.
Document reveals back condition
Mangione wrote about his health issue online, saying he has spondylolisthesis – a condition where one of the bones in the spine slips forwards.
Sky News’ Data and Forensics team obtained a 14-page document uploaded to his Google Drive account in 2021.
He details the severity of his “injury” as “low grade two” and goes into fitness goals, diet advice and notes about the condition.
The suspect’s notes say he has back condition spondylolisthesis
His X banner image shows a back X-ray
It’s unclear if the condition is linked to the motive, which police have not publicly identified, but it gives context about his health issues.
Analysis of his Goodreads profile also shows he read books including Crooked: Outwitting The Back Pain Industry and Getting On The Road To Recovery, and Why We Get Sick: The Hidden Epidemic At The Root Of Most Chronic Disease – And How To Fight It.
A banner image on his X account also features an X-ray of a lower back with screws.
Law enforcement officials told NBC News they are looking at whether the X-ray is Mangione’s or from a relative and whether it’s connected to the shooting.
‘Violence is necessary to survive’
Mangione appears to have had an active social media presence.
His X account regularly shared and reposted pieces about topics such as artificial intelligence (AI), philosophy, and the future of humanity.
His Goodreads account also gave a four-star review to Industrial Society And Its Future – by notorious US terrorist Theodore Kaczynski.
The piece, which rails against technological advancement, became known as the Unabomber Manifesto after its author began a mail bombing campaign which lasted nearly 20 years.
Three people were killed and dozens were injured before Kaczynski’s arrest in 1996.
The Goodreads review said: “When all other forms of communication fail, violence is necessary to survive. You may not like his methods, but to see things from his perspective, it’s not terrorism, it’s war and revolution.
“‘Violence never solved anything’ is a statement uttered by cowards and predators.”
Luigi Mangione. Pic: Facebook
Why are some calling Mangione a ‘hero’?
A search of social media sites such as Reddit reveals a thread of people who are sympathetic to the suspect.
Highly rated comments on the site include: “Screw the McDonald’s employee that ratted him out” and “Only a matter of time till shirts with #FreeLuigi start popping up”.
To many, these are shocking comments about someone accused of carrying out a cold-blooded killing. But what’s behind them?
Many in the US pay thousands in expensive insurance premiums to cover themselves and their family, while others rely on the Medicare federal insurance programme.
Support for Mangione appears to come from resentment over this and accusations that companies go to great lengths to avoid paying for treatments in order to maximise their profits.
“He got charged with murder quicker than insurance companies deny claims”, said a comment on Reddit with nearly 7,000 likes.
One post that went viral on X before the suspect’s arrest was from Anthony Zenkus, a Columbia University professor.
He wrote: “We mourn the deaths of the 68,000 Americans who needlessly die each year so that insurance company execs like Brian Thompson can become multimillionaires.”
Read more from Sky News:
Shooting prompts US healthcare debate
Police shared this picture of the suspect following the shooting. Pic: NYPD
A chart shared widely on X claims to show denial rates by UnitedHealthcare exceed those of competitors, using data from consumer finance website ValuePenguin. This is consistent with publicly available data from 2023 analysed by Sky News.
Other people online appear to be angry about what they say is the disparity between the resources put into Mr Thompson’s case and how less well-off people are treated.
One comment on Reddit with 4,000 likes says: “The murdered guy in death, like in life, is still sucking up a huge undeserved and unwanted portion of resources.
“How many underprivileged people’s murders are going unsolved because NYPD and the feds are spending millions on this overpaid, rich, morally questionable millionaire’s murder.”
Arrested in McDonald’s with ‘ghost gun’
Mangione was detained in a Pennsylvania McDonald’s after a five-day search, carrying a gun that matched the one used in the shooting and a fake ID, police said.
He was arrested in Altoona, around 230 miles (370km) west of New York, after a tip-off from a McDonald’s employee who recognised him from the police appeals.
Mangione also had a fake New Jersey ID matching one used by the suspect to check into a hostel before the killing, said New York police commissioner Jessica Tisch.
He was found carrying a “handwritten document” that Ms Tisch said “spoke to both his motivation and mindset”.
Joseph Kenny, New York’s chief of detectives, said it appeared to show “some ill-will towards corporate America”.
Pennsylvania prosecutor Peter Weeks said Mangione was found with a passport and $10,000 (£7,840) – $2,000 of it in foreign currency.
‘Message’ on bullets
Brian Thompson, 50, was chief executive of UnitedHealthcare – the fourth-largest public company in the US behind Walmart, Amazon, and Apple – and was paid about $10m (£7.8m) a year.
It’s the largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans and manages insurance for employers and state and federally funded programmes.
Mr Thompson – who was married with two sons – was shot on 4 December as he was walking to a New York hotel where his company was holding an investors’ conference.
CCTV showed a person shooting Mr Thompson from behind. Pic: NYPD/Reuters
As Mr Thompson walked towards the Hilton hotel on Sixth Avenue, a gunman appeared behind him from between parked cars.
He was shot in the back and calf and died from his injuries.
The words “defend”, “deny”, and “depose” were written on the cases of bullets found at the scene – similar to the title of a book that criticises health insurance companies.
Mr Thompson’s wife said he was an “incredibly loving father to our two sons” and a “loving, generous, talented man who truly lived life to the fullest”.
UnitedHealthcare called him a “highly respected colleague and friend to all who worked with him”.
US
Who is Cory Booker? The Democrat making a marathon speech against Trump (and why it’s not a filibuster)
A Democratic senator is delivering a marathon speech in the US Senate in protest against Donald Trump.
Cory Booker, 55, took to the floor at 7pm local time on Monday (midnight in the UK), saying he would remain there as long as he was “physically able”.
As of 5pm in the UK, Mr Booker was still going – more than 17 hours after he started.
The senator for New Jersey said his goal is to “uplift the stories of Americans who are being harmed by the Trump administration’s reckless actions, attempts to undermine our institutions, and disregard for the rule of law”.
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During his speech, Mr Booker has only taken brief breaks from speaking, giving the floor instead to questions from his Democratic colleagues, according to Sky News’ US partner network, NBC News.
According to the rules of the Senate, as long as he stays at the podium Mr Booker will hold the floor – meaning he cannot leave at any point, even to go to the toilet or to eat.
So who exactly is the Democratic senator, and what is his multi-hour speech all about?
Mr Booker has criticised the Trump administration during his speech. Pic: Senate Television via AP
Rising star of Democratic Party
Mr Booker was born in Washington DC and moved to northern New Jersey when he was a boy.
He is a graduate of Stanford University and Yale Law and started his career as a lawyer for charities.
Entering politics, he was considered a rising star in the Democratic Party. He was elected to serve on the city council of New Jersey’s biggest state, Newark, and then as mayor, a position he held until 2013.
He was first elected to the US Senate in 2013 during a special election held after the death of politician and businessman Frank Lautenberg.
He went on to win his first full term in 2014 and was re-elected in 2020.
2020 presidential bid
In February 2019 Mr Booker launched his bid for the US presidency from the steps of his home in Newark.
At the time, he played on his personal ties to the “low-income, inner city community” and urged for the US to return to a “common sense of purpose”.
He later dropped out of the race after struggling to raise the money required to make a bid for the White House.
Senator Cory Booker. Pic: AP
Why is he speaking in the Senate?
By holding the floor in the Senate, Mr Booker is protesting against the Trump administration.
Before he began, the senator said he had the intention of “getting in some good trouble”, NBC News reported.
He read letters from constituents about how Mr Trump’s cuts were already taking a toll on their lives.
He claimed the US was giving up being a global leader, citing Mr Trump’s proposals to take over Greenland and Canada while feuding with longtime allies.
He also occasionally took aim at Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, who is advising Mr Trump and leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
“In just 71 days, the president of the United States has inflicted so much harm on Americans’ safety; financial stability; the core foundations of our democracy,” Mr Booker said on the floor.
“These are not normal times in America. And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate.”
Appearing to waver slightly on Tuesday morning, Mr Booker was accompanied by Senator Chris Murphy. In 2016, Mr Booker joined the Connecticut Democrat when he held the floor for almost 15 hours to argue for gun control legislation.
Read more:
Could Donald Trump run for a third term?
Why he is not a filibuster
Some reports have referred to Mr Booker’s speech as a filibuster, but technically it is not.
A filibuster is a speech meant to halt the advance of a specific piece of legislation.
Mr Booker’s performance is instead a broader critique of Mr Trump’s agenda, meant to hold up any business scheduled to take place in the Senate and draw attention to what Democrats are doing to contest the president.
Democrats have been forced to use these types of opposition methods as they do not hold a majority in either congressional chamber.
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