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The US and Chinese officials said they discussed trade expansion, an extension of the truce, fentanyl, US port entrance fees, rare earths, TikTok and more. Li described the discussions as "candid", while Bessent said they were "very substantial negotiations". Bessent said the truce could be extended, pending the president's decision, marking a second extension since it was first signed in May. Talking points While the White House has officially announced the highly anticipated Trump-Xi talks, Beijing has yet to confirm that the two leaders will meet. On the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit, Trump hinted at possible meetings with Xi in China and the United States. "We’ve agreed to meet. We’re going to meet them later in China, and we're going to meet in the US, in either Washington or at Mar-a-Lago,” he said. Among Trump's talking points with Xi are Chinese purchases of US soybeans, concerns around democratically-governed Taiwan, which Beijing views as its own territory, and the release of jailed Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai. The detention of the founder of the now-defunct pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily has become the most high-profile example of China's crackdown on rights in Hong Kong. Trump also said that he would seek China's help in Washington's dealings with Russia, as Moscow's war in Ukraine grinds on. Fragile truce Tensions between the world's two largest economies flared in the past few weeks as a delicate trade truce, reached after a first round of trade talks in Geneva in May and extended in August, failed to prevent the two sides from hitting each other with more sanctions, export curbs and threats of stronger retaliatory measures. The latest round of talks has likely centred around China's expanded controls of rare earths exports that have caused a global shortage. That has prompted the Trump administration to consider a block on software-powered exports to China, from laptops to jet engines, according to a Reuters report. (FRANCE 24 with Reuters)
