President Biden said in a new interview that he warned Chinese President Xi Jinping that it would be a "gigantic mistake" to violate the sanctions against Russia around the time that Russia invaded Ukraine earlier this year.
Biden said on CBS's "60 Minutes" that he called Xi earlier this year after Xi met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing during the Olympics. "I said, 'If you think that Americans and others will continue to invest in China based on your violating the sanctions that have been imposed on Russia, I think you're making a gigantic mistake; but that's your decision to make.'"
Biden added that the call to Xi was not meant to threaten him, but simply to warn of consequences that would stem from violating the sanctions. "Thus far, there's no indication they've put forward weapons or other things that Russia has wanted," Biden said about China.
In response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. has imposed sanctions on the country, including blacklisting Putin, his family and allies and banning imports of Russian energy.
At the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in Uzbekistan Friday, Putin said that he and Xi have "discussed what we should do in the current conditions to efficiently counter unlawful restrictions" from the West.
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