China’s leader urges ‘healthy’ competition with US

WASHINGTON (AP):

President Donald Trump yesterday hailed the “truly great friendship” he has forged with Xi Jinping as the Chinese leader began his highly anticipated state visit by pressing for the world’s two biggest economies to work more closely together to avoid friction as they compete.

While Trump has many thorny issues to discuss with the president of America’s biggest economic rival, he focused on his long relationship with Xi as the two gathered with aides for opening remarks before formal talks.

“From the time of my first election in 2016, President Xi and I have forged a friendship, a truly great friendship, actually, built on mutual respect and the vital interests of our people,” Trump said.

China has resisted the Trump administration’s urgings – and economic threats – to use its considerable leverage to prod Iran to agree to US terms to end the nearly seven-month war. Xi wants to see Trump permanently halt arms sales to Taiwan and loosen export restrictions on cutting-edge advanced chips. The two sides on Wednesday agreed to extend by two months a one-year trade truce that was set to expire November 10 as they work to find a more durable agreement.

In their private conversation, Xi also urged Trump to “prudently handle the Taiwan issue”, according to the Chinese state media outlet Xinhua.

China has made clear it views Taiwan as the most sensitive issue in the US-China relationship. Beijing considers Taiwan to be Chinese territory and vows to annex the island by force if necessary. The US is obligated by law to provide Taiwan with sufficient hardware to deter any armed attack from the mainland. The US has said it opposes any unilateral changes to the status quo by either side.

China has repeatedly pressed Washington to permanently halt the arms sales, including when Trump and Xi met in Beijing in May.

After that meeting, Trump said he was holding off on final approval for a record US$14-billion arms package that was in the pipeline. He also described arms sales to Taiwan as a “very good negotiating chip” with China.

Xi was also more pointed than Trump in his public remarks, saying Chinese and American interests are “deeply intertwined” and that the “competition should be a healthy one and should be kept within bounds”.

He also reiterated his warning that the US and China must avoid the “ Thucydides trap”, referring to the idea that, when a rising power threatens to displace an established one, the result is often war. Xi offered a similar warning when Trump visited Beijing in May.

“It should be a race of catching up with one another, not a wrestle in which one either wins or loses,” Xi added.

Xi also announced that China will invite 100,000 American youth to come to his country for studies and exchanges in the next five years and that China will send two pandas to the zoo in Atlanta. He called the beloved animals an “envoy of friendship” and that they will meet the American people in a “few days”.

‘AI under human control’

Trump said in a social media post that artificial intelligence — “superintelligence” as he is trying to rebrand it — will be high on the agenda amid growing global anxiety that the technology will kill jobs or potentially even wipe out humanity.

“I want to leave it exactly where it is,” Trump wrote. “That is China’s position also.”

Xi also touched on AI in his opening comments, saying that the two countries had a responsibility to ensure that humans always operate AI.

“We have both the capability and responsibility to develop and manage AI for good and ensure that a development of AI is always under human control and serves the well-being of the people,” the Chinese leader said.

The two countries’ finance ministers met earlier this week, with the US proposing a new “notification mechanism” for AI incidents between the two nations.

The two sides were also expected to discuss the ongoing conflict in Iran. Trump has argued to little effect that China, which is far more dependent on Gulf oil than the US, has plenty of incentive to use its sway with Tehran to help force an end to the conflict.

But Trump’s war of choice has unnerved Beijing, with the government condemning the US and Israeli military action and Xi previously expressing concerns the conflict signalled a return to what he called the “law of the jungle”.

The US administration has warned China, Tehran’s biggest trading partner, not to aid Iran’s military effort.

But, earlier this month, Trump played down a Wall Street Journal report that Chinese entities had supplied Tehran with satellite images of a Jordanian military base before an Iranian strike in July that killed three US soldiers working there.

“You know, when they say that China spies on us, I say you’re right, and we spy on them too,” Trump told reporters.