Chinese President Xi Jinping will participate in a virtual climate summit on Friday with French and German leaders "
at the invitation of Emmanuel Macron,
" a spokeswoman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.
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This meeting, the holding of which was not known until now, will take place during the visit to China of the American envoy for the climate John Kerry, currently in Shanghai for discussions with his Chinese counterparts.
"
President Xi Jinping will participate on April 16 in the video summit of Chinese, French and German leaders on the climate,
" Hua Chunying, spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said in a statement, without giving further details.
According to Chinese diplomacy, John Kerry, former Secretary of State (2013-2017) under Barack Obama, is due to meet with his counterpart in charge of the file, Xie Zhenhua.
Washington's objective: to prepare the great virtual summit on the climate, scheduled for April 22 and 23 at the initiative of US President Joe Biden.
Xi Jinping has not yet confirmed his participation in this event.
China "
now assumes responsibility for global climate governance
" and will not be embroiled in a US-centric climate initiative, the nationalist daily
Global Times
warned Thursday
.
The Sino-Franco-German summit on Friday could thus have the objective of indicating to Washington that the Chinese and Europeans remain fully engaged on the climate issue.
From his first day at the White House, on January 20, Joe Biden had recorded the return of the United States to the Paris climate agreement, which Donald Trump had left almost four years earlier.