to double its numbers in the last decade. welcome to our viewers on pbs in america and around the globe. president biden has spent more than two hours on the phone with his chinese counterpart, xijinping. the two leaders both issued warnings about taiwan, which has once again emerged as a key point of tension, following reports of a possible visit there by the us house speaker nancy pelosi. although the visit hasn t been confirmed, mr biden told xi jinping, that washington strongly opposed any unilateral moves that would change the island s status, or undermine stability across the taiwan straits. president xi said: those who play with fire will only get burned. joe biden responded to that with on taiwan, the us policy has not changed. let s speak now to craig singleton, a national security expert, and former us diplomat, who s a senior china fellow at the foundation for the defense of democracies. thank you forjoining here on bbc world news. it was something of a marat
diplomatic breakthrough. perhaps the biggest takeaway is that president biden and xi jinping are possibly planning to meet face to face as early as this fall during the 620 leaders summit. i think that the call in general, it is really part of a white house led effort to ensure that the intensified competition between the united states and china doesn t veer into the military domain and so they see these leader to lead exchanges as vital to that effort and that includes being able to have a very frank discussion about taiwan. it very frank discussion about taiwan. , . . , taiwan. it is a hard sell, though. taiwan. it is a hard sell, though, isn t taiwan. it is a hard sell, though, isn t it, - taiwan. it is a hard sell, though, isn t it, for - taiwan. it is a hard sell, though, isn t it, for an l though, isn t it, for an american president to seek to persuade his chinese counterpart that there is no change in us taiwan policy given that a senior member of his very own party is plann