Pompeo calls on Biden administration to confront China 'head-on' like Trump

Former US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo on Friday (local time) said that US President Joe Biden's administration has to confront China 'head-on' in the same way the previous Donald Trump-led administration had done.

"For 50 years, the United States allowed the Chinese Communist Party to walk all over us, destroyed millions of jobs here, they stole intellectual property. They infiltrated our research institutions. All of this was, frankly, under Republican and Democratic presidents alike," Pompeo said in a programme by Fox News.

He further opined that Biden's promise of protecting Americans from China only matters to the extent that the administration is prepared to back it up.

"When they were spying on us from a consulate in Houston, we closed it. When they were engaging in trade practices that were unfair, we put tariffs on them. Every place in our livelihoods, our administration took it on. That's what they need to do," Fox News quoted Pompeo.

He further urged the importance of the Biden administration to address the Chinese threat.

"... I spent two-and-a-half-years both here in the United States talking to governors right there, working at the state level. I went out to the Wisconsin legislature, they're trying to influence our state legislatures," said the former State Secretary.

Pompeo's statements come after Biden on Thursday underscored about the crackdown in Hong Kong, human rights abuses in Xinjiang during his first conversation with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.

The US President also underlined Beijing's coercive and unfair economic practices and military aggression actions in the region, including toward Taiwan.

The ties between the two countries had deteriorated under the Trump administration, over human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Hong Kong protests, unfair trade practices by Beijing, lack of transparency concerning the pandemic and China's military aggression in various parts of the world, including Taiwan.

( With inputs from ANI )