Joe Biden will use this week’s G7 summit to encourage allies to join Washington in taking a harder stance towards Beijing, as the US president capped a string of new actions with an executive order to boost scrutiny of Chinese software and apps.
The ratcheting up of pressure sets the stage for the UK-hosted summit, when Biden hopes to persuade his counterparts to rebuke China over its persecution of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, its crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, its economic coercion of countries such as Australia, and its aggressive military activity in the South and East China Seas.
As he boarded Air Force One on Wednesday for his first overseas trip as US president, Biden said he would use his week in Europe to strengthen alliances and “make it clear to [Russia’s Vladimir] Putin and to China that Europe and the US are tight”.