Wang Yi, Blinken meet in Munich amid balloon spat
Senior diplomat Wang Yi on Saturday met informally with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the sidelines of a security conference in Munich, with state media saying that Wang urged Washington to "change course, acknowledge and repair the damage that its excessive use of force caused to China-US relations." The meeting came hours after Wang, director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, described America's downing of a 200-foot Chinese balloon off the coast of North Carolina earlier this month as "hysterical and absurd". Beijing insists the aircraft was a weather balloon that was blown off course rather than being for surveillance, as the US claims.  "To have dispatched an advanced fighter jet to shoot down a balloon with a missile, such behaviour is unbelievable, almost hysterical," Wang said. "There are so many balloons all over the world, and various countries have them. So, is the United States going to shoot all of them down? We urge the United States not to do such preposterous things simply to divert attention from its own domestic problems." Wang also accused the US of "100-percent protectionism, 100-percent self-servingness, 100-percent unilateral action" in economic policies such as the Chips Act, which earmarks billions of US dollars for subsidies and research in the semiconductor sector. He added that he hoped Washington would "take a pragmatic and proactive attitude" towards China and restore relations to a "track of sound development". In an interview with the broadcaster NBC following his meeting with Wang, Blinken said there had been no discussion with regard to rescheduling a planned trip to China that was called off in the wake of the balloon incident.  "I told him quite simply that that was unacceptable and can never happen again," Blinken said, referring to the balloon's incursion into US airspace. (Agencies)