SIMIC

Mr Wang also attended a regional summit in Myanmar, which the military regime hailed as a sign of growing recognition of its rule, more than a year after ousting the civilian government in a coup.

The minister's 11-day trip was part of China's push to offer an alternative to the US's Indo-Pacific Strategy and assuage regional suspicions of its own intentions by emphasising shared economic benefits.

The urgency of that effort has been increased by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which has fueled concern that China could take military action to resolve territorial disputes in places like Taiwan.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to press the US's case that Russia's actions set a dangerous precedent during G-20 meetings in Bali, Indonesia.

Mr Wang, for his own part, has been promoting the Global Security Initiative announced by President Xi Jinping in April, in an effort to appeal to developing nations that may be wary of the Western-led campaign to punish Russia with sanctions.

In Bali, Mr Wang and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov pledged to jointly safeguard the common interests of developing countries while further expanding bilateral cooperation, reports Xinhua.

In another meeting with India, a nation that has moved closer to the US after military clashes on its border with China, Mr Wang told Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar that ties have improved of late and called for more efforts to put the relationship back on track.

Mr Blinken and Mr Wang were to meet Saturday on the sidelines of the G-20 in a high-level meeting expected to set the stage for a phone call between President Xi and US President Joe Biden.

Mr Wang told his Indonesian counterpart Retno Marsudi on the sidelines of the G-20 meetings that Beijing wants to work with Asean to "oppose any resurgence of the Cold War mentality and bloc politics in the region," China's Foreign Ministry said.

That contrasts with Biden's effort to expand a coalition of "like-minded democracies," via groupings like the Quad - with Australia, India and Japan. Most countries in the region count China as their largest trading partner and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity that Biden rolled out in May remains largely conceptual.