AI, North Korea, Trump: What Biden and Xi discussed in their final face-to-face meeting

President Joe Biden met with Chinese President Xi Jinping face-to-face Saturday afternoon on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference in Lima, Peru — their last meeting of Biden’s presidency.

They began their meeting with a handshake. During that moment, a reporter in the room asked how the leaders would discuss North Korea to which Biden responded, “peacefully.”

Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan were on either side of the president as the meeting took place.

Xi spoke first, starting off by saying that it was a “great pleasure” to see Biden again. He added that the U.S.-Chinese relationship has “gone through ups-and-downs,” but indicated that over the course of the last four years it has stabilized.

Xi added that it’s time to look at the past but to “treat each other as partner and friend,” rather than adversary. Xi added that stability in their relationship benefits the whole world and said that they should “make the wise choice” for the international community.

Xi: China is ‘ready to work’ with Trump

The Chinese leader didn’t shy away from discussing the changing political landscape and spoke about the upcoming transition, with President-elect Donald Trump preparing to take the helm.

“China is ready to work with the new U.S. administration, to maintain communication, expand the cooperation and manage differences, so as to drive forward a steady transition of the China-U.S relationship for the benefit of the two peoples,” Xi added.

Biden recounted the two decades long relationship the leaders have had, a relationship that has spanned Biden’s time as vice president and as president.

“We haven’t always agreed, but our conversation has always been candid and always been frank,” Biden said. “We have never kidded one another. We’ve been level with one another. I think that’s vital.”

“These conversations prevent miscalculations, and they ensure the competition between our two countries will not veer into conflict, the competition, not conflict,” he added.

Biden also hit on the points that senior administration officials previewed as major topics of conversation: cooperation on AI and joint counter-narcotics efforts. Biden noted that overdose deaths in the U.S. are declining for the first time in a decade.

A reporter in the room asked Biden whether he has any concerns about the relationship under Trump, but he did not respond. The same reporter asked Xi whether he had any concerns about tariffs that Trump has called for, but Xi did not respond.

AI and nuclear weapons — and Biden’s ‘deep concern’

A readout of the call discusses some of the topics that Biden and Xi discussed during the bilateral meeting. The leaders discussed two areas where they found cooperation: Artificial intelligence safety measures and countering narcotics.

They made a notable agreement on AI safety: an affirmation for the need to “maintain human control” over the use of nuclear weapons.

“The two leaders affirmed the need to maintain human control over the decision to use nuclear weapons,” the readout from the White House said. “The two leaders also stressed the need to consider carefully the potential risks and develop AI technology in the military field in a prudent and responsible manner.”

But there were a couple of areas where the two leaders seemed to diverge in opinion — one of the major ones dealing with North Korea’s recent deployment of troops to fight with Russia against Ukraine.

“President Biden condemned the deployment of thousands of DPRK troops to Russia, a dangerous expansion of Russia’s unlawful war against Ukraine with serious consequences for both European and Indo-Pacific peace and security. He expressed deep concern over the PRC’s continued support for Russia’s defense industrial base,” the readout said.

Cross-strait issues also came up, with Biden calling “for an end to destabilizing PRC military activity around Taiwan.”

Biden also talked about the need to “resolve the cases of American citizens who are unjustly detained or subject to exit bans in China,” according to the readout.