US President Donald Trump met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing this Thursday (14), kicking off a bilateral summit that is expected to address topics such as trade, tariffs, Taiwan and Iran, and which will last until Friday.
Xi highlighted the global attention focused on the meeting and stated that one of the main challenges for the two countries is to avoid the so-called “Thucydides Trap”, a concept used to describe historical moments in which rivalries between an emerging power and a dominant power ended up leading to military conflicts.
In addition to raising the rhetorical question of whether the US and China could avoid the Thucydides Trap, Xi asked whether the two countries could jointly address key challenges to global stability and work towards “a better future” for humanity.
Xi also stated that Taiwan was the most important issue for US-China relations and that, if not managed well, it would lead the bilateral relationship into a “dangerous” situation, according to state media. Beijing considers Taiwan, a democratically self-governed island, part of its territory. The island’s ruling party rejects this claim.
Trump said that the relationship between Washington and Beijing will be “better than ever”. The American president also highlighted that he has known Xi personally for longer than any other recent American or Chinese leader, during his first term.
