Jakarta –
President of the United States Joe Biden vowed he would not hesitate to defend US interests against China after he ordered it to be shot down spy balloon China. Even so, Biden also stated that he would keep the door open for cooperation with the Asian giant.
Reported by the news agency AFPWednesday (8/2/2023), this was conveyed by Biden in his annual speech to members of parliament on Tuesday (7/2) local time.
“I am committed to working with China that can advance American interests and benefit the world,” Biden said.
“But make no mistake – as we showed last week, if China threaten our sovereignty, we will act to protect our country. And we did,” he said to applause from lawmakers.
“I’m not going to apologize that we’re investing to make America stronger — investing in American innovation, in industries that will define the future China wants to dominate,” Biden said.
China was one of the few foreign policy issues Biden touched on in his State of the Union address that lasted more than an hour.
He also promised long-term support for Ukraine but made no mention of Iran, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, North Korea, or this week’s devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria.
Earlier, a US fighter jet on Saturday shot down what the Pentagon called a Chinese spy balloon after crossing into the Atlantic Ocean. The incident made the Minister of Foreign Affairs United States of America Antony Blinken canceled a visit to Beijing aimed at reducing tensions between the two countries.
See also video ‘China’s spy balloon is the size of a 15-storey building’:
(it/it)
