Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday threw a grand welcome for US President to reset ties between the two global superpowers. As Trump shook hands with Xi, the US president leaned to pat him on his arm, suggesting a gesture of warmth.
The military guard lined up outside the Great Hall of the People to welcome Trump, with a band playing the US national anthem and a gun salute for the Republican leader. The optics of the grand welcome of Trump in Beijing is being widely seen as a reset of the US-China relations that have undergone testing times over trade tariffs, West Asia war and fentanyl sale.
Trump and Xi delivered toasts to each other at the start of the state banquet during the last event of the day after the two leaders concluded a bilateral meeting and cultural event on Thursday. Other events are scheduled for Friday morning (local time) before the US president departs China.
Trump and Xi discussed trade during bilateral talks with the Chinese president saying Beijing’s “door of opportunity will open wider” however, there’s no clarity about what the statement meant.
The Trump administration is hoping to set up a Board of Trade with China in order to manage trade disagreements between the two nations.
Xi Jinping on Thursday warned Trump of “clashes and conflicts” with America over Taiwan if the issue is not handled properly and the Chinese president said Taiwan was “the most important issue in China-US relations”. The Taiwanese government claims that the self-governing island is a sovereign state but Beijing claims there is only one China and that Taiwan is part of it.
Xi told Trump that “if the Taiwan issue is handled properly, the bilateral relationship will enjoy overall stability. Otherwise, the two countries will have clashes and even conflicts, putting the entire relationship in great jeopardy,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning stated.
However, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio later told NBC News that America’s position on Taiwan was “unchanged”. “They always raise it on their side. We always make clear our position, and we move on to the other topics,” Rubio added.
The US-Israel’s war in Iran, which entered its 76th day on Thursday, also featured in talks between Trump and Xi and the two leaders in a joint communique agreed that the Strait of Hormuz, which deals with the passage of 20 percent global oil supply, should remain open and that Iran shouldn’t have nuclear weapons.
.: President Xi would like to see a deal made. He said, ‘If I can be of any help at all, I would like to be of help.’ Anybody that buys that much oil has obviously got some kind of relationship, but he’d like to see the Hormuz Strait open.
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47)
As per the White House readout, the US and China had “agreed that the strait of Hormuz must remain open to support the free flow of energy” and that Xi had shown interest that Beijing could purchase more US oil in order to lower their dependency on Strait of Hormuz.
However, in China’s communique, the part of buying more US oil and China decreasing its dependence on Iran was missing.
