The date and time for the meeting between Austin and Chinese Minister of National Defense General Wei Fenghe have not been set yet, the official said, but Austin is scheduled to speak at the Shangri-La Dialogue on Saturday, June 11, one day before Wei speaks.
The two have only spoken on the phone once. On April 20, Austin and Wei spoke for about 45 minutes, marking the first time a US Defense Secretary had spoken to his Chinese counterpart since the Trump administration more than a year earlier.
But the Pentagon provided few details of the conversation.
“It was a good first conversation,” another senior defense official said at the time. “There was a range of issues discussed. Clearly, security issues in the Indo-Pacific were brought up. I think I’m going to just leave it at that for now.”
“Indo-Pacific nations have made clear that they seek a region that’s rooted in transparency, in freedom of navigation, in peaceful resolution of disputes, in respect for sovereignty and the territorial integrity of sovereign states,” said the official. “At the same time, we have also seen what an assault on these shared principles looks like, from the [People’s Republic of China’s] harassment in the South China Sea to Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine, and we’re actively working to build a more transparent and inclusive security order for the region.”
In response, the Chinese embassy in Washington lodged a “stern representation” with the US, according to a statement, urging it to “avoid sending wrong signals to the ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist forces.”
On Monday, China also sent 30 warplanes into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone, the highest daily figure in four months.
