Chinese leader Xi Jinping is not President Joe Biden’s “old friend,” Biden said on June 16 as he raised concerns about Beijing’s willingness to help find the origins of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic.
Asked if the president would call Xi and ask him “old friend to old friend” to re-admit World Health Organization investigators, Biden said: “Let’s get something straight: We know each other well, we’re not old friends. It’s just pure business.”
The remarks appeared to be a departure from previous comments from Biden where he sought to highlight his close relationship with Xi cultivated from when he was vice president.
Xi was China’s vice chair, and thus Biden’s counterpart at the time. The two had spent more than 24 hours in private meetings and 17,000 miles traveling together during that time, according to Biden. During a 2013 trip Biden made to Beijing, Xi addressed the then-vice president as “my old friend.”
Biden, speaking at a press conference after his meeting with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Geneva, expressed skepticism about the Chinese regime’s cooperation with a virus origins investigation.
“China is trying very hard to project itself as a responsible and very, very forthcoming nation, and they are trying very hard to talk about how they’re helping the world in terms of COVID-19 and vaccines,” the president said.
“Look, certain things you don’t have to explain to the people of the world, they see the results. Is China really actually trying to get to the bottom of this?”
Biden in May ordered aides to find answers to the origin of the virus that causes COVID-19, which was first reported in the Chinese city of Wuhan, and said U.S. intelligence agencies are looking at rival theories, potentially including the possibility of a laboratory accident in China.
BY CATHY HE
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