US President Joe Biden on Tuesday called Chinese President Xi Jinping a “dictator”, Reuters reported.
Biden”s remarks, made at a fundraiser in California, come a day after Secretary of State Antony Blinken met Xi on a trip to China that was aimed at easing tensions between the two countries.
“The reason why Xi Jinping got very upset in terms of when I shot that balloon down with two box cars full of spy equipment in it was he didn’t know it was there,” Biden said in the fundraiser.
“That’s a great embarrassment for dictators. When they didn’t know what happened. That wasn’t supposed to be going where it was. It was blown off course,” Biden added.
The comments are a reference to the Chinese spy balloon that was shot down over the Atlantic Ocean in February and which magnified US-China tensions.
China criticized the US for downing its surveillance balloon, saying it reserves the right for any necessary reaction to the incident.
Blinken had been scheduled to visit China soon after the incident, but postponed the visit in the wake of the discovery of the surveillance balloon.
During Monday”s meeting, Blinken and Xi agreed to stabilize the intense rivalry between Washington and Beijing so it does not veer into conflict, but failed to produce any major breakthrough during a rare visit to China by the Secretary of State.

Biden himself said on Monday he thought relations between the two countries were on the right path, and he indicated that progress was made during Blinken’s trip.
When he was asked, shortly after the balloon incident, if it weakens US-China relations, Biden replied, “No. We made it clear to China what we’re going to do. They understand our position. We’re not going to back off.”