Pope, China congratulate Joe Biden, US President-elect

Pope Francis, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, has offered his congratulations to US President-elect Joe Biden during a call, according to a statement on Friday.

China has also congratulated Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on winning the US presidential election.

According to a statement from the Biden-Harris transition team, the Pope Francis and Biden discussed some policy areas in which Biden is likely to break from President Trump.

“The president-elect expressed his desire to work together on the basis of a shared belief in the dignity and equality of all humankind on issues such as caring for the marginalized and the poor, addressing the crisis of climate change, and welcoming and integrating immigrants and refugees into our communities,” the statement reads.

Francis has been outspoken on these issues and has repeatedly called on global leaders to take more action to confront them. Biden has laid out ambitious plans to tackle the climate crisis, and he plans to lift the United States’ refugee resettlement cap, which Trump had lowered to a record level.

Biden will be the second Catholic president in U.S. history, following John F. Kennedy.

China’s message on Friday also ended days of speculation about when Beijing would formally acknowledge the victory.

“We have been following the reaction on this U.S. presidential election from both within the United States and from the international community,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told a briefing in Beijing on Friday.

“We respect the American people’s choice and extend congratulations to Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris,” Wang added.

China’s acknowledgment came after multiple television networks projected Biden would defeat Donald Trump in Arizona, one of the battleground states where the president has looked to overturn the election.

China was one of the few countries that had so far withheld comment, as Trump contested the results.

“We understand that the result of the U.S. presidential election will be determined following the US laws and procedures,” Wang said.

Beijing’s official reaction to Biden’s victory had been relatively muted. President Xi Jinping hasn’t offered public congratulations, while the foreign ministry this week gave largely vague answers at a briefing on Monday, saying that it hoped the new administration would “work in the same direction as us going forward.”