China’s Xi Wishes Biden ‘Speedy Recovery’ from Covid-19

Chinese President Xi Jinping contacted U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday to wish the American leader a “speedy recovery” from COVID-19, according to state media.

Biden tested positive for Covid-19 and has “very mild symptoms,” the White House said Thursday. China’s news agency Xinhua used “sends [a] message” to describe Xi’s contact with Biden.

Xi expressed his “deepest sympathies,” according to a CNBC translation of the Chinese state media report. The brief report did not mention whether the leaders communicated on other topics.

Biden has said at a briefing he expected to speak with Xi within 10 days, but did not disclose any further details. The two leaders last spoke in March, mostly about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. China has refused to call the attack an invasion.

In previous remarks, China’s foreign ministry accused U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken of “smearing” the country after calling for action to counterbalance Beijing’s influence.

In his speech at George Washington University, Blinken called China the “most serious long-term challenge to the international order” amid the Russian war in Ukraine.

“China is the only country with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military and technological power to do it,” Blinken said.

“Beijing’s vision would move us away from the universal values that have sustained so much of the world’s progress over the past 75 years,” Blinken added.