U.S. President Joe Biden said on Wednesday he had not changed his view that Chinese President Xi Jinping was effectively a dictator, Paralel.Az reports citing Reuters.

Biden held a solo news conference after four hours of talks with Xi on the outskirts of San Francisco. At the end of the news conference, he was asked whether he still held the view that Xi was a dictator, something he said in June.

"Look, he is. He's a dictator in the sense that he's a guy who runs a country that is a communist country that's based on a form of government totally different than ours," Biden said.

In response, China's foreign ministry said it "strongly opposes" the remarks, without mentioning Biden by name.

"This statement is extremely wrong and irresponsible political manipulation," foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told reporters on Thursday at a routine briefing.