Just help us understand what we know and Beijing's probably going to be cross about this.
I think what we've been seeing play out over the last week or so has been the buy the administration's blueprint for its
engagement with the Asia-Pacific with China. As Anthony Blinken was just talking about as kind of the the U.S. at odds with what
the U.S. wants to gain in the United States. I have to be careful how you know we use nuance to talk about when this is
not a Cold War necessarily. But some would say that there is sort of a Cold War mentality
coming. I mean we already heard Wang E. In recent months talk about the threat of the United States building a NATO like
alliances in the Asia-Pacific. And we saw with Biden here just this weekend in the Asia Pacific at the beginning part of this
week. He. There are many different kinds of engagements policies that the
United States is rolling out now. Taiwan is the there's the tricky subject here. Anything. It's a red line. It's anything
that the United States does when Taiwan crosses that red line. And Beijing made it very clear when Biden was meeting with the
President Yoon in South Korea when he was meeting with Kishi in Japan and especially the quad on Tuesday in in Tokyo that Taiwan
is is an off limits subject that there is no room for negotiation or concessions on that matter. Now in part and
parcel with this scoop that Bloomberg News has on Taiwan know Biden announced this IPF the Indo-Pacific economic framework a
new kind of economic engagement not trade pact. It doesn't deal with tariffs and the like.
But it does not include Taiwan. And at least 50 senators in the United States called for Taiwan to be included. But you know of
those 13 signatories of IPF several of them did not want Taiwan included because that would put them at risk from backlash from
Beijing. So this engagement enhanced economic cooperation with Taiwan would be sort of on the sidelines of IPF but very
similar. And that's what we're gaining. Like you can't come in but we'll still talk with you anyway. Well maybe I just say an
IVF lite one right. Yeah. That's what's going on externally. I'm just wanting domestically there seems to be this sort of tension
between the premier. Well I'm warning of these dire consequences if officials don't move decisively. And on the back of that
we're Xi Jinping who seems to be doubling down on Covid 0. Sure. So there've been a number of different message proclamations
coming out from senior Chinese officials on how to respond to the rapidly deteriorating state of the Chinese economy whereas
Xi Jinping has talked about doubling down on Covid efforts to stamp out the virus where season where Lee could sung the
premier he's more in charge of the economy and he's not denouncing Covid zero policies. But at the same time he is
giving much harsher assessments of the Chinese economy to local government officials who met at an immediate through a video
conference an emergency meeting on Wednesday. Much more harsh comments coming out from sources telling Bloomberg News then
what state media outlined. Of course he is essentially saying growth risk slipping out of a reasonable range. China will pay a
huge price with a long road to recovery. If economy can't keep growing at a certain rate that growth rate in this second
quarter must be positive. Must be positive. How can you get positive growth when Shanghai the commercial center is locked
down. Other cities in lockdown. Beijing and restrictions. A Bloomberg economics is predicting a contraction of minus two
point seven. But his marching orders you must have growth in the second quarter. That leaves local government officials. I'm
going on a little bit too long here. But that's a complicated story.
And local government officials they get marching orders. They get conflicting marching orders. Covid. Covid. Covid. Economic
growth economic growth economic growth. How do you do both. They contradict each other. So in at least eight senior officials and
financial bureaucrats have told Bloomberg News that there is a paralysis in decision making and execution at the local level
right now. Because of this I don't want to call it rift between she and Li but they're getting different orders and they're
there. Their progress in the Communist Party is to stamp out Covid right. They cannot progress but if they don't deliver
growth they're not going to be promoted either. All right. So that's where that paralysis is spreading out like a spider's web
too. That's what the said this week right there about how there's essential governments and the orders coming down and
then it's whether they can execute on the local level. Right. Yeah. Phil what they're looking for when it comes to what the
data on everything absolute that's could be quite quite key in the next few few months. So yeah I guess to seize point on the
ground is really where that execution takes place. And they have for weeks last four weeks of the second quarter to hopefully get
that from maybe currently below. Zero sum someone positive. Steve thank you so much Stephen Engle chief North Asia
correspondent.