Trump-Xi Summit LIVE: US President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, are set to discuss key issues dividing the two superpowers as they meet in Beijing, with trade, America’s relations with Taiwan, and the war in Iran on the cards. Xi greeted Trump with pomp and ceremony as they met at the Great Hall of the People, a centre for key cultural and social events on the Western side of Tiananmen Square, in a lavish welcome that belies the deep tensions between the world’s biggest economies. They will have a bilateral meeting before Trump visits the Temple of Heaven — a religious complex dating to the 15th century that symbolises the relationship between heaven and earth. Trump and Xi will also attend a state banquet.
Trump arrived for the two-day summit, accompanied by top CEOs, including Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Tesla’s Elon Musk, at an elaborate welcome ceremony on Wednesday night, and his motorcade rolled past skyscrapers lit with Chinese characters reading “Beijing Welcome”. The Republican president has said he expects a “great big hug” from Xi as he banks on what he believes is a strong personal relationship with the Chinese leader, who he has admiringly said rules China with an “iron fist”. Top of his wish list will be business deals on agriculture, aircraft and other topics, with a host of top businessmen in the US leader’s delegation.
Ahead of a high-stakes US-China summit, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who also accompanied Trump, said the United States is looking for China to take a more active role in ending the war in Iran. “We hope to convince them to play a more active role in getting Iran to walk away from what they are doing now and trying to do now in the Persian Gulf,” Rubio told Fox News in an interview aired Wednesday. “It’s both our top political challenge, geopolitically, and it’s also the most important relationship for us to manage… It’s a big, powerful country. It’s going to continue to grow, but we’re going to have interests of ours that are going to be in conflict with interests of theirs,” he added.