Biden and Xi spoke on the phone a little earlier today for nearly two hours.

White House officials said they expected the call could turn intense; a preliminary meeting between the two leaders' aides stretched for seven hours earlier this week. And Biden upped the stakes [yesterday] declaring his Chinese counterpart "does not believe democracies can be sustained in the 21st century."

Biden spoke to Xi at a key juncture. According to US officials, China is weighing whether to provide military or financial assistance to Russia, which has requested it as its military sustains major losses in Ukraine. If China agrees, it could dampen its relationship with the West for decades to come.

...
...the United States has conveyed to some NATO allies it believes China has some willingness to support Russia...American officials say they believe Xi has been unsettled by Russia's invasion and the performance of Russia's military, which has experienced logistical and strategic setbacks since the invasion began more than two weeks ago. 

Watching from Beijing, Xi was caught off-guard that his own intelligence had not been able to predict what would happen, even though the United States had been warning of an invasion for weeks, the officials said.

 

That is in conflict with other statements from our intelligence services, or the State Department, I forget which, that Putin told Xi at the Beijing Winter Olympics that he was going to invade Ukraine and that Xi asked that he wait until the Games closed. The Games closed on Feb. 20 and Russia invaded Feb. 24.