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Good morning. I’m North Asia correspondent Lisa Visentin, reporting from Gyeongju, a tourist town in South Korea that is hosting the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit.World leaders from 21 member countries have descended on the town, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, who will meet at about 1pm AEDT today.World leaders pose for a photograph during an APEC dinner last night.Credit: APThere are also chief executives from global companies, adding to an entourage of thousands of staffers, some 3000 reporters, and countless police that have overwhelmed the small town, putting pressure on its limited infrastructure.The travelling Australian press pack is among those who have struggled to secure hotels, while The New York Times has reported that cruise ships were leased to serve as makeshift accommodation.Pedestrians walk along Hwangnidan Street in Gyeongju on Tuesday.Credit: BloombergLatest postsLatest postsAlbanese, speaking in Gyeongju, says Australia wants to less tension in global trade and a “positive” outcome from the meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping, which is due to kick off within the hour.“We obviously also want to see a reduction in tension around the world, and the United States and China have an important role as the two major economies and the two major powers that exist in our region and right around the globe,” he said.He added: “We live in an era of strategic competition, but what we are seeing is really positive developments. It is a good thing that President Trump and President Xi meeting today. I’ve developed good, positive relationships with both President Trump and President Xi.”Officials rolled out the red carpet for Trump’s arrival in Gyeongju on Wednesday, with a band playing YMCA on the tarmac, a 21-gun salute and gifts including a golden crown and a laurel leaf medal. But away from the pomp and pageantry, South Korea’s lively protest culture was on display, with protesters angry at the Trump administration’s tariffs and demands for higher defence spending.Hundreds tried to march to the Bomun Tourist Complex, the main venue for the APEC summit, but were stopped nearly five kilometres away by security forces, The Korean Times reported. A group broke through police lines near the Gyeongju National Museum, where Trump met with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, and lay on the ground as police officers moved to arrest them. Others, holding “No Trump!” and “No Kings: Trump Not Welcome” signs were blocked by police from reaching the US embassy.Anti-Trump supporters show their feelings in Gyeongju on Wednesday.Credit: Getty ImagesAn anti-Trump rally makes its way through Gyeongju on Wednesday.Credit: Getty ImagesThe protests were relatively small by South Korean standards, and dwarfed by the millions of Americans who took to the streets across the US just over a week ago in what is believed to be the largest co-ordinated demonstration against Trump and his government since he took office in January.South Koreans’ vitriol wasn’t just reserved for Trump. A few hundred metres away, at the gates of Gyeongbokgung palace, another group supporting Trump chanted “No China!” and “CCP [Chinese Communist Party] out!”Right-leaning groups, led by Liberty University, rally in support of Donald Trump in Gyeongju yesterday, shouting “Chinese Communist Party Out”.Credit: Getty ImagesMore Trump supporters rally in Gyeongju.Credit: Getty Images At a press conference in Gyeongju this morning, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was asked if he had been personally invited by Donald Trump to attend the dinner with the US president and a small number of other world leaders last night.We don’t get a clear answer on this, with Albanese saying “we received the invitation in the usual way”.Donald Trump, Anthony Albanese and Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong arrive for dinner in Gyeongju on Wednesday.Credit: Getty ImagesLoadingAs South Korea was hosting the event, it is likely the official invite came through their channels.“I was very pleased to accept the invitation last night. And it was a great honour for Australia to be invited. It’s not the usual thing for such a small, intimate dinner as it was last night to occur, but a real opportunity, and one that I was very pleased to accept,” Albanese told reporters.He would not reveal the timing of when he received the invite, but confirmed he knew going into the dinner that he would be seated at Trump’s right-hand side. Advertisement The meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping is the first time the pair have met in person in more than six years, and the first since the president returned to the White House.Their last face-to-face meeting was in June 2019 at the G20 summit in Japan. That encounter ended with Trump saying he would allow US companies to continue trading with Chinese tech giant Huawei, a move seen as a significant concession amid security concerns over the company’s links to the Chinese government.Donald Trump and Xi Jinping meet in Osaka in 2019.Credit: APTrump also agreed to pause further US tariffs on China and said he would continue to negotiate on trade “for the time being”.The dispute between the two countries had escalated in the preceding year, with Trump accusing China of stealing intellectual property and forcing US firms to share trade secrets to do business in China.The main event today is the blockbuster meeting on the APEC sidelines between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping after months of trade tensions between the world’s two biggest economies destabilised global markets and supply chains.The meeting is scheduled for 11am (1pm AEDT), in Busan, South Korea, a port city about 76 kilometres south of Gyeongju, though the exact venue details are not yet known.The high stakes meeting marks the first time the pair will sit down face-to-face since Trump returned to the White House, and follows two known phone calls between the leaders.US President Donald Trump speaks at the APEC CEO summit in Gyeongju on Wednesday.Credit: BloombergThe US and Chinese presidents are expected to agree to a truce deal that will roll back some of the recent trade restrictions their countries have slapped on each others’ economies, including new port fees on shipping operations and US threats to tighten control on China’s access to American software.As part of the anticipated deal, Trump and his officials have already foreshadowed that his administration will lower tariffs in exchange for Beijing’s co-operation on fentanyl trafficking.LoadingHowever, the big ticket item is securing a delay to Beijing’s planned sweeping curbs on rare earth exports, which have threatened to derail global high-tech manufacturing, in exchange for Trump abandoning plans to hit China’s export with an additional 100 per cent tariffs on November 1.In a positive sign ahead of the meeting, China made its first purchases of American soybeans yesterday after a months-long hiatus that threatened to financially cripple US farmers – a key voting base for Trump.Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Royal Australian Airforce jet winged its way into Busan, the closet international airport to the APEC summit, yesterday from Kuala Lumpur, pulling up on the tarmac next to US President Donald Trump’s Air Force One.Albanese came directly to Gyeongju from Kuala Lumpur, where he had attended the ASEAN summit, and arrived a day earlier than his original schedule in time for an intimate dinner with Trump and a handful of other leaders last night.Anthony Albanese and Donald Trump dining with other world leaders in Gyeongju, South Korea yesterday.Credit: APLoadingThe dinner was hosted by South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, with Trump the guest of honour. It is not exactly clear how Albanese scored an invitation, along with the leaders of Canada, New Zealand, Vietnam, Thailand and Singapore, but it proved diplomatically fruitful, with the US president full of bonhomie and praising Albanese for their “great meeting a week ago” and saying the prime minister had done a “fantastic job”.“We’re working together on rare earths, but we’re working on a lot of things together,” Trump said.You can read a recap of the dinner here Advertisement Good morning. I’m North Asia correspondent Lisa Visentin, reporting from Gyeongju, a tourist town in South Korea that is hosting the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit.World leaders from 21 member countries have descended on the town, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, who will meet at about 1pm AEDT today.World leaders pose for a photograph during an APEC dinner last night.Credit: APThere are also chief executives from global companies, adding to an entourage of thousands of staffers, some 3000 reporters, and countless police that have overwhelmed the small town, putting pressure on its limited infrastructure.The travelling Australian press pack is among those who have struggled to secure hotels, while The New York Times has reported that cruise ships were leased to serve as makeshift accommodation.Pedestrians walk along Hwangnidan Street in Gyeongju on Tuesday.Credit: Bloomberg
