Trump and Xi meet for high-stakes talks in Beijing
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Chinese leader Xi Jinping welcomed US President Donald Trump with a handshake on Thursday in Beijing for a superpower summit on thorny issues including Iran, trade and Taiwan. Xi greeted Trump at the opulent Great Hall of the People at just past 10:00am (0200 GMT), a grand reception that belies the deep tensions between the world’s biggest economies. Accompanied by Trump, Xi shook hands with several US officials, including Pentagon Peter Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who was known throughout his career as a fierce opponent of Beijing. Trump and Xi stood in the centre as a Chinese military band played The Star-Spangled Banner and then the Chinese national anthem as cannons fired. Jumping schoolchildren in brightly coloured outfits waving US and Chinese flags chanted “welcome, welcome” as Trump and Xi walked past them in the square. The two leaders will also enjoy a state banquet at the hall in the evening, and Trump will visit the historic Temple of Heaven, a World Heritage site where China’s emperors once prayed for a good harvest. The US president arrived for the two-day summit on Air Force One late on Wednesday accompanied by top CEOs, including Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Tesla’s Elon Musk — symbols of business deals Trump hopes to reach. The trip to Beijing marks the first by a US president in nearly a decade, after Trump visited in 2017, accompanied — unlike this time — by his wife Melania. ‘Big hug’ Top of Trump’s wish list will be business deals on agriculture, aircraft and other topics, with a host of top businessmen in the US leader’s delegation. Aboard Air Force One en route to Beijing, Trump vowed on social media to push Xi to “open up” China to US firms “so that these brilliant people can work their magic”. But Trump is dealing with a different and more emboldened China to the one he visited nine years ago, with a host of unresolved trade and geopolitical tensions between the two countries. The Iran war in particular has threatened to weaken