Trump asks Xi to ‘open up’ to China

Just days before the Trump-Xi summit, Beijing is rewriting the rules of global trade — punishing companies that move away from China, blocking major Western tech deals, and screwing Europe for choosing a side.

Zhang Han, spokesman for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, said Taiwan is an internal issue and a matter of the Chinese people.

“We strongly oppose the United States engaging in any kind of military relations with China’s Taiwan region and strongly oppose the United States selling arms to China’s Taiwan region. This position is consistent and clear,” he said during a weekly briefing in Beijing on Wednesday.

In December, the Trump administration announced an $11 billion (€9.4 billion) arms package for Taiwan, its largest ever.

Taiwan is “the center of China’s core interests” and consistently honoring commitments made by US administrations is “an international obligation that the US side has a duty to fulfill,” Zhang said.

China considers democratically ruled Taiwan its own territory and has not ruled out using force to establish its control.

China and United States of America They remain deeply interconnected economically despite years of tariff disputes and attempts at separation. While America-China Business Faced with a sharp decline – including a 20% drop in Chinese exports to the US – Beijing has offset the deficit by expanding trade with Africa, Europe and Latin America, contributing to a record global surplus.

Both sides still distrust each other: the US is dependent on China for rare earth elements and as an export market, while China wants access to advanced US technologies such as Semiconductor.

Ahead of Donald Trump’s During the visit to Beijing, the two governments aim to stabilize relations and avoid further tariff increases, especially as global economic pressures are rising due to the conflict in Iran. Analysts have described the meeting as a “risk-management summit”, with China potentially positioned as a mediator to help secure vital trade routes such as the Middle East. strait of hormuz.

anus Postponing your trip US President Donald Trump is set to meet China’s leader Xi Jinping in Beijing at the weekend – after recently starting a war with Iran in March.

The meeting comes as soon as the world is faced Ongoing energy crisis due to blockade of Strait of HormuzAnd peace talks between Tehran and Washington appear to be at an impasse. Meanwhile, the deepening trade dispute between China and the US is still hidden behind the scenes.

Against this backdrop, both countries have an incentive to ensure that the meeting between the two leaders is successful. Neither Trump nor Xi is ready to accept defeat. Both want to remain the “strong man”.

DW takes a look at the topics likely to be on the agenda of the two leaders and the prospects for the much-awaited talks.

President Trump is accompanied by a group of aides, family members and business leaders on the trip to Beijing.

These leaders include:

• Jensen Huang of Nvidia
• Apple’s Tim Cook
• Elon Musk of Tesla and SpaceX
• Kelly Ortberg from Boeing
• Brian Sykes from Cargill
• Jane Fraser of the City
• H. Lawrence Culp, GE Aerospace
• David Solomon, Goldman Sachs
• Micron’s Sanjay Mehrotra
• Dina Powell McCormick, META President and Vice President

During his flight to China, Trump said that his first request to Chinese President Xi Jinping would be to “open up” China to American trade.

“I would ask President Xi, a leader of extraordinary talent, to ‘open up’ China so that these talented people can work their magic, and help bring the People’s Republic to even greater heights!” Trump posted on his Truth social from Air Force One.

The “brilliant people” Trump mentioned are American business leaders who accompanied him on the trip.

President Donald Trump has left the United States for China, where he is scheduled to arrive on Wednesday for a much-awaited summit with President Xi Jinping.

The meeting between the two world leaders comes at a critical moment for the world amid the war with Iran, rising energy prices, trade and artificial intelligence.

“We are two superpowers,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House on Tuesday. “Militarily we are the strongest nation on earth. China is considered second.”