Sunak-Xi meeting at G20 cancelled: Downing Street

NUSA DUA, Indonesia: A planned meeting between Britain’s new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 summit on Wednesday has been cancelled, Downing Street said.

“The meeting has been cancelled because of scheduling issues,” a spokeswoman for the prime minister told AFP. The meeting, announced Tuesday evening, was to be the first such summit in nearly five years.

Downing Street earlier stated that Sunak will urge a “frank and constructive relationship” between London and Beijing.

“The challenges posed by China are systemic and they are long-term,” the statement added, citing Beijing’s “authoritarian leadership intent on reshaping the international order”.

But the key issues being discussed at the G20, including the global economy and food and energy security, cannot be resolved “without coordinated action by all the world’s major economies. That includes China”.

President Xi has stolen the spotlight at the G20 meeting in Bali, Indonesia, on only his second overseas trip since the pandemic.

Leaders have lined up to hold talks with him, including US President Joe Biden, who spent around three hours discussing how to lower the temperature on their superpower rivalry before the summit began.