Gabriel Crossley and Yew Lun Tian.

WASHINGTON/BEIJING – U.S. President Joe Biden met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping to complete their longest exchange. However, the three-and-a-half hours of discussions did not seem to resolve any divergent positions.

China’s state media described it as “frank and constructive”, substantive, substantive, and fruitful,”

The talks were held via video conference and lasted for longer than planned according to senior U.S. officials. They covered a range of issues, from trade to North Korea to Iran to North Korea to Afghanistan to North Korea.

Nothing in both readouts indicated that either side would have to change their increasingly unpopular positions which had made it difficult for relations between the two world’s largest economies to stabilize, especially over Taiwan.

However, it was not easy to determine if there had been any significant changes. Scott Kennedy, an expert on China at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies, stated that they appeared to have exchanged opinions about all things, but did not announce any policy decisions.

“Perhaps that will be revealed in the coming days, but if not, this ended up being a recitation of both sides’ basic positions. They seem to agree that the relationship needs to have some guardrails and stability, but they don’t agree about how to get there.”

After the meeting, the senior U.S. official stated that neither the goal of the U.S.-American exchange was to reduce tensions nor was it the end result.

The official stated that they were not anticipating a breakthrough. There was nothing to report.

Chinese media claimed that Xi stated that he hoped Biden would show “political leadership” and bring the U.S.’s policy toward China back on a “rational, practical” track. But, it seemed to only offer ominous warnings, not much incentive.

Xi spoke out about Taiwan’s potential crisis and said China must take decisive action if they see pro-independence forces crossing a redline. However, he also stated that China was “like two ships which should not collide”

Daniel Russel was the U.S. top diplomat for Asia during the presidency of Barack Obama. He is currently with the Asia Society think-tank. Russel noted that it took 10 months for leaders to reach the stage where they could have face-to-face discussions, even though these were held virtually, and indicated more might be on the horizon.

He stated that “We need to think of it not as a single sort-of-summit but as one of many important conversations which can steer the relationship onto a more steady course, while both sides continue their furious competition.”

“Hopefully the Chinese side is empowering their teams to be able to hold more authoritative talks at lower levels. But this is just the beginning of process of working out of a deep hole and ultimately that requires more regular engagement between the two leaders themselves.”

Paul Haenle, director of the Carnegie–Tsinghua Center for Global Policy in Beijing and a former National Security Council official, said that while the meeting has stabilized the relationship in the near term, “the long term structural challenges in the U.S.-China relationship have not been addressed in any substantial way.”

Even though there was no apparent progress, many Chinese analysts expressed optimism. Wang Huiyao (president of the Center for China and Globalization) said the meeting had sent a positive signal.

“I believe it will stop all the negative spiral in bilateral relations” he stated, while adding that the agreement should help lower tensions in Taiwan Strait.

Wu Xinbo, director of American Studies at Shanghai’s Fudan University, said the meeting continued the positive trend of improving bilateral ties following a phone call between Biden and Xi in September.

He said that he believed both parties would focus their efforts on increasing cooperation and better managing their differences to reduce frictions in bilateral ties.