
BEIJING/TOKYO -- Ahead of the first face-to-face, or mask-to-mask, engagement between the Biden administration and China in Anchorage, Alaska, on Thursday, each side still seeks to impose its own framing.
On Tuesday, as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin talked with their Japanese counterparts in Tokyo at a "two-plus-two" meeting focusing heavily on "China's behavior" in the region, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian signaled to reporters that Beijing hopes the Alaska meeting will be an opportunity to get bilateral relations back on the right track.