US President Joe Biden spoke to Xi Jinping for straight two hours: Report

US President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s phone call on Thursday lasted two hours, according to an AFP report. “Last night, I was in the phone for two straight hours with Xi Jinping,” Biden told reporters — an unusually long interaction for a US President, with whom even face-to-face meetings rarely stretch beyond an hour. It was the first call between the leaders after Biden assumed office on January 20.

The US President warned that if the United States doesn’t “get moving” on China policy, “they’re going to eat our lunch.”

During the call, Biden challenged Xi on human rights, trade and regional muscle-flexing, which aimed at setting the tone for the US-China relationship.

Ties between Beijing and the US have strained ever since Xi came to power, and under former president Donald Trump China found itself on the receiving end of trade tariffs as relations frayed.

Biden, who met Xi during his time as vice president under Barack Obama, is under pressure to maintain Trump’s stance.

Earlier, the White House said the president “underscored his fundamental concerns about Beijing’s coercive and unfair economic practices, crackdown in Hong Kong, human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and increasingly assertive actions in the region, including toward Taiwan,” during the call. 

The two leaders also spoke about the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and weapons proliferation, the White House said.