Biden thinks world 'vastly exaggerate' China-Russia alliance

WASHINGTON

US President Joe Biden said Friday that he does not take “lightly” the growing alliance between Russia and China.

“I don’t take China lightly, I don’t take Russia lightly, but I think we vastly exaggerate,” Biden said in Canada in response to a question about Chinese President Xi Jinping’s meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in Moscow.

"I've been hearing now for the past three months about China's going to provide significant weapons to Russia," Biden said at a news conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. "They haven't yet, doesn't mean they won't, but they haven't yet,"

Biden said Russia and China have had 40 meetings in 10 years, adding that the West has significantly expanded their alliances.

“If anything’s happened the West has coalesced significantly more,” he said.

What China and Russia are doing “could get significantly worse,” Biden said, “But let's put it in perspective. We are united coalitions. We the United States and Canada.”

-Trudeau and TikTok

Trudeau noted that Canada has taken a similar decision with the US to ban the Chinese-based popular social media app, TikTok, on government-issued phones, citing concerns around privacy and security.

In response to a question on whether he was comfortable with the idea of his children or family members using TikTok, Trudeau said: “I'm glad that on their phones that happen to be issued by the government they no longer access Tik Tok. That was a big frustration for them.”

"As governments, we have to make sure we're doing what we can to keep people safe in the public square, making sure we're pushing back against hate speech and incitations to violence online, and we're carefully calibrating legislation to do that," he said.