US President Joe Biden has referred to his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, as a “dictator” during an event in Kentfield (California) to raise funds for his re-election campaign.

Biden was talking about the Incident with alleged Chinese spy balloonthan washingtonordered to demolish last February after being detected flying over US soil.

According to the president, Xi felt “embarrassed” by the episode since he “did not know that (the balloon) was there.” “That It is the great shame of dictators, when they do not know that something has happened“, he added.

The US authorities already suggested in February that the Chinese president was not part of the decision to send the balloon, according to what CNN published at the time, citing sources familiar with the situation.

According to Biden, the balloon “was blown off course by the wind” when it was flying over Alaska and Xi didn’t know it until he was shot down by the US.

Despite the comment, the president has assured that Beijing wants to “get back into a relationship” with Washington, and has congratulated US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on his recent trip to China, where he met with Xi and other senior government officials.

Blinken traveled to Beijing over the weekend to try to reopen lines of communicationafter the incident with the balloon forced the cancellation of his long-awaited trip to China last February, raising tensions between the powers.