Trump, Xi end visit with 100-day plan
On North Korea issue, leaders agree to work together on resolving conflict in peaceful way
PALM BEACH, Fla. — The United States and China wrapped up a two-day presidential summit here by announcing a 100-day plan to improve strained trade ties and boost cooperation between the rival nations.
But they appeared to reach no clear path forward on North Korea, and the Trump administration’s unexpected military strike in Syria — launched on the summit’s first day — highlighted an area where President Donald Trump and counterpart Xi Jinping differ sharply.
Trump aides who participated in the talks described a productive first meeting between the leaders, saying they exhibited “positive” chemistry. Treasury Secretary Wilbur Ross said the two sides agreed to speed up trade talks to help close a lopsided imbalance in China’s favor.
“This may be ambitious, but it’s a big sea change in the pace of discussions,” Ross said.
Trump advisers said the goal, at least from the U.S. side, was to increase American exports to China. But they offered no details about how they planned to achieve that. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said there was “acknowledgment” from the Chinese side “that we do need to get to a more balanced trade environment.”
But the surprise U.S. military response to Syrian President Bashar Assad’s apparent chemical weapons attack on civilians threw a wild card into the summit. U.S. warships fired 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a military airfield in Syria during Trump’s Thursday night dinner with Xi at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump told Xi about the attack “and explained the rationale behind it,” U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said.
Tillerson insisted that Xi was not rattled by Trump’s decision: “President Xi expressed an appreciation for the president letting him know and providing the rationale and said he understood that such a response is necessary when people are killing children.”
Xi does not like surprises, and the fact that he was photographed shaking Trump’s hand and smiling at his declaration of “friendship” while the United States made a surprise military move was not going to be popular in China.
Top Chinese leaders exist in a world where public appearances are tightly choreographed, the news media are controlled and protocol is paramount.
The Global Times, a Communist Party-controlled newspaper known for its nationalist tone, viewed the missile strike as a projection of strength. In an editorial, the paper said Trump launched the strike “to establish his authority as the U.S. president. He wants to prove that he dares to do whatever Obama didn’t dare to do,” the newspaper said.
On North Korea, Tillerson said the Chinese agreed that the mounting threat of Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program had “reached a very serious stage,” but he said there was no discussion of any “package deal” in which Beijing would increase pressure on Pyongyang in exchange for the United States’ curbing military drills with South Korea.
The two sides had “a real commitment to work together to see if this can be resolved in a peaceful way,” Tillerson said. But he warned that Pyongyang must halt its provocative nuclear and ballistic-missile testing.