New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said she needs to be able to raise areas of concern with Chinese leader Xi Jinping without the country being on the receiving end of retaliation.
The comments come ahead of her expected meeting on Nov. 18 with Xi on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Bangkok, Thailand.
Ardern is the next Western leader to formally meet with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader after U.S. President Joe Biden, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, French President Emmanuel Macron, and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
She said the face-to-face meeting with Xi, the first since 2019, will provide an opportunity to discuss New Zealand’s strong economic relationship with China and raise issues of disagreements, such as human rights problems in Xinjiang and the military build-up in the Indo-Pacific….