Trump G20 US China
President Donald Trump, left, poses for a photo with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan, Saturday, June 29, 2019.
OSAKA, Japan (AP) —
President Donald Trump declared relations with China were "right back on
track" after he and President Xi Jinping sought Saturday to de-escalate a
prolonged trade war between the economic powerhouses despite doubts about
either's willingness to compromise on a long term solution.
Xinhua, the Chinese state-run news agency, said the leaders had
agreed to a new cease-fire in a yearlong trade war, adding that stalled trade
talks would resume and the U.S. would hold off on threatened additional tariffs
on Chinese goods.
The apparent truce marks a pattern for talks between Trump and
Xi, who have professed their friendship with each other and hit the pause
button on protectionist measures after their conversations, only to see
negotiations later break down over the contentious details.
White House officials declined immediate comment. But President
Donald Trump said earlier Saturday that he would make an announcement on the
results of his talks with Xi during a news conference later in the day.
Taking place on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit in
Japan, the meeting with Xi marked the centerpiece of four days of diplomacy for
Trump, whose re-election chances have been put at risk by the trade war that
has hurt American farmers and battered global markets. Tensions rose in recent
weeks after negotiations collapsed last month.
At a subsequent meeting with Turkey's president, Trump said
talks with Xi went "probably even better than expected."
"The negotiations are continuing," he said.
Seated across a lengthy table flanked by top aides, both leaders
struck a cautiously optimistic tone after they posed for photographs.
"We've had an excellent relationship," Trump told Xi
as the meeting opened, "but we want to do something that will even it up
with respect to trade."
Xi, for his part, recounted the era of "ping-pong
diplomacy" which helped jump-start U.S.-China relations two generations
ago. Since then, he said, "one basic fact remains unchanged: China and the
United States both benefit from cooperation and lose in confrontation."
"Cooperation and dialogue are better than friction and
confrontation," he added.
The meeting with Xi is one of three Trump had lined up Saturday
with world leaders displaying authoritarian tendencies.
Trump had his first face-to-face sit-down with Saudi Arabia's
Mohammed Bin Salman since the U.S. intelligence community concluded that the
crown prince directed the grisly murder of Washington Post columnist, and
American resident, Jamal Khashoggi last year. Trump also met with Turkish
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an ostensible NATO ally whom the U.S. sees as
drifting dangerously toward Russia's sphere of influence.
Meeting with the Saudi crown prince, Trump praised his
"friend" for taking steps to open up the kingdom and extend freedoms
to Saudi women.
Trump, however, ignored reporters' questions about Mohammed's
alleged role in Khashoggi's death. He has long sought to minimize the crown
prince's role in Khashoggi's murder, and has been reluctant to criticize the
killing of the royal critic at a Saudi consulate in Turkey last year. Trump
views the kingdom as the lynchpin of its Middle East strategy to counter Iran.
He is also a fan of its pledges to spend billions on U.S. military hardware.
The meeting came a week after Trump pulled back from ordering a
military strike on Iran in retaliation for its downing an American unmanned spy
plane. Trump is also relying on the Saudi government to support an elusive
Israel-Palestinian peace plan being developed by his son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
With Erdogan, Trump said the leaders will "look at
different solutions" to Turkey's planned purchase of the Russian-made
S-400 surface-to-air missile system. U.S. officials have threatened that
purchase would halt the sale of the U.S.-made F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, though
Erdogan has called it a done deal.
"Turkey has been a friend of ours," Trump said. He
blamed the Obama administration for not agreeing to sell U.S.-made Patriot
missile batteries to Turkey.
Saturday's meetings came the day after Trump, with a smirk and a
finger point, dryly told another authoritarian leader, Russia's Vladimir Putin,
"Don't meddle with the election" in their first meeting since the
special counsel concluded that Russia extensively interfered with the 2016
campaign.
The diplomacy plays out as Trump's re-election campaign battle
is beginning to heat up, a contest that could be partially defined by whether a
resolution to the trade war with China can be found before more economic pain
is inflicted on Americans.
The president has threatened to impose tariffs on an additional
$300 billion in Chinese imports — on top of the $250 billion in goods he's
already taxed — extending his import taxes to virtually everything China ships
to the United States. He has said the new tariffs, which are paid by U.S.
importers and usually passed onto consumers, might start at 10%. Earlier, the
administration had said additional tariffs might reach 25%.
The two countries are sparring over the Trump administration's
allegations that Beijing steals technology and coerces foreign companies into
handing over trade secrets. China denies it engages in such practices. The U.S.
has also tried to rally other nations to block Chinese telecom firm Huawei from
their upcoming 5G systems, branding the company a national security threat and
barring it from buying American technology.
Beijing has retaliated by levying its own tariffs on goods from
the United States. On Friday, it criticized what it calls "negative content"
about China in legislation before the U.S. Congress, saying it would further
damage relations already roiled by disputes over trade and technology.
Chinese Foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said cooperation
in important areas would be disrupted if the draft National Defense
Authorization Act passes. The bill blocks transfer of sensitive technology to
China and prevents Chinese state companies from receiving U.S. federal funds.
But if history repeats itself — and most analysts are betting it
will — Trump and Xi will agree to some kind of cease-fire.
Under the cease-fire scenario, existing tariffs and
counter-tariffs on many of each other's goods would remain in place. But no
additional import taxes would take effect. This would buy time for U.S. and Chinese
officials to restart talks that stalled last month after 11 rounds of
negotiations. Trump said Friday he had not agreed to a cease-fire with Xi as a
precondition for their meeting.
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