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Media Report
April 07 , 2017
  • Reuters reports that President Donald Trump pressed Chinese President Xi Jinping to do more to curb North Korea's nuclear program and help reduce the gaping U.S. trade deficit with Beijing in talks on Friday, even as he toned down the strident anti-China rhetoric of his election campaign. Trump spoke publicly of progress on a range of issues in his first U.S.-China summit – as did several of his top aides – but they provided few concrete specifics other than China's agreement to work together to narrow disagreements and find common ground for cooperation. As the two leaders wrapped up a Florida summit overshadowed by U.S. missile strikes in Syria overnight, Xi joined Trump in stressing the positive mood of the meetings while papering over deep differences that have caused friction between the world's two biggest economies. Trump's aides insisted he had made good on his pledge to raise concerns about China's trade practices and said there was some headway, with Xi agreeing to a 100-day plan for trade talks aimed at boosting U.S. exports and reducing China's trade surplus with the United States. Speaking after the two-day summit at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson also said that Xi had agreed to increased cooperation in reining in North Korea's missile and nuclear programs – though he did not offer any new formula for cracking Pyongyang's defiant attitude.

  • The Financial Times reports: "While Donald Trump joked on Thursday evening that he had received "nothing, absolutely nothing" from Xi Jinping in initial talks at their first summit, the US president hailed an early rapport with his Chinese counterpart ahead of more substantive negotiations scheduled for Friday...But the much anticipated meeting between the two men has already been overshadowed by the US missile attack on Syria and what it might signal about the Trump administration's willingness to use military force to achieve his goals...On Friday afternoon in Beijing, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson condemned the chemical weapons attack, calling for an 'independent and comprehensive UN investigation', but also signalled China's displeasure with the US response. 'China never interferes in the internal affairs of other countries. The Syrian president is elected by the people of Syria and we respect their choice," said Hua Chunying, adding that Beijing "always opposed the use of force in international relations'. The US military strike could lend credibility to Mr Trump's threat to punish North Korea unilaterally for its repeated missile and nuclear tests — or to the US president and his secretary of state Rex Tillerson's warnings that they would take a tough stance on the Chinese military's 'island-building' activities in the South China Sea."
  • Foreign Policy comments: "Pilippines President Rodrigo Duterte ordered his military to deploy troops to uninhabited islands in the disputed South China Sea in a significant policy shift widely seen as a challenge to China. 'It looks like everyone is making a grab for the islands there. So we better live on those that are still unoccupied. What's ours now, we claim it and make a strong point from there,' Duterte said. He took it a step further, pledging to personally raise his country's flag on the Pag-Asa Island in the Spratly Islands archipelago on Philippines Independence Day, June 12. 'The unoccupied, which are ours, let's live on it,' Duterte said, exuding his cavalier fashion that's won him international notoriety. He gave his surprise announcement during a visit to a Philippines military base on Palawan. Duterte's remarks, if followed through, could lead to escalation in the region...'I realign myself in your ideological flow and maybe I will also go to Russia to talk to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin,' Duterte said. 'There are three of us against the world. China, Philippines, Russia.' "
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