Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Monday that China needs to de-escalate the U.S.-China trade war — of which President Donald Trump has largely stoked the flames.
Category: Xi Jinping
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US treasury secretary says ‘there is a path’ with China over tariff negotiations
‘The Chinese will see this high tariff level is unsustainable for their business,’ says Scott Bessent
The US treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said “there is a path” to an agreement with China over tariffs after he had interactions with his Chinese counterparts last week in Washington.
“I had interaction with my Chinese counterparts, but it was more on the traditional things like financial stability, global economic early warnings,” Bessent told ABC News’s This Week on Sunday, explaining that he spoke to the Chinese during International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington. “I don’t know if President Trump has spoken with President Xi,” he added.
- Trump and China can’t even agree on if Trump and China are having trade talks
President Donald Trump said in a Time interview published Friday that Chinese President Xi Jinping has called him, and that he has already made 200 deals regarding tariffs that he will announce “over the next three to four weeks.”
Stock futures fall as China throws cold water on the market rally
Stock futures were slipping Thursday morning as the latest twist in U.S.-China relations took the air out of Wednesday’s rally. Beijing pushed back, saying there have been no trade talks — contrary to the hints and claims swirling stateside.
- ‘China needs to change,’ Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Wednesday that China’s current economic model — built on “exporting its way out of economic troubles” — is unsustainable, and that the U.S. wants to help it change.
What does China really think about Trump? They know about humiliation and won’t take it from him
Economically, the trade war may be bad news for Xi Jingping, but ideologically and politically it is a gift
Last week, Mao Ning, head of China’s foreign ministry information department, posted a blurry black-and-white clip of a moment in history. In 1953, Chairman Mao made a defiant speech of resistance to what he called US aggression in Korea.
Kim Il-sung, the North Korean leader and founder of the Kim dynasty, now in its third generation, had invaded US-backed South Korea. When Kim’s attempt to unite Korea by force appeared to be failing, China threw nearly 3 million “volunteers” into the war and succeeded in fighting to the stalemate that has prevailed ever since.
Will Trump’s tariff chaos be China’s gain in global trade wars?
As China retaliates against tariffs, it is also making strategic manoeuvres on EU and Asia to maximise opportunities
On the basis of Napoleon’s dictum “never interrupt your enemy while they are making a mistake”, there was a large incentive for China to do precisely nothing as Donald Trump displayed his determination to lose friends and induce market panic. Indeed, the Chinese advocates of passivity cited a social media meme attributed to President Xi Xinping: “Do nothing. Win.”
Initially it was tempting for China to sit back and watch the US’s former allies recoil at Trump’s disruptive war on globalisation and let them realise that,by comparison, China represented an oasis of stability, modernity and predictability.
Xi Jinping celebrates China’s rising power — and his own
HARI SREENIVASAN: President Xi Jinping opened China’s twice-per-decade Communist Party Congress today with a lengthy list of his achievements during his first five-year term, and his vision of where he hopes to take his nation.
But beyond the words, Xi is asserting power like no Chinese leader in decades.
William Brangham reports.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The applause, the music, it was a reception befitting the commanding role that Xi Jinping has taken since being named party leader five years ago.
He opened today’s proceedings by hailing reforms he’s put in place, and proclaiming a — quote — “new era for China.”
PRESIDENT XI JINPING, China (through interpreter): The Chinese nation has realized a great leap, from declining in modern history to twisting its fate fundamentally and continuously moving to prosperity.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Over 3.5 hours, Xi laid out his vision to shape the nation of 1.4 billion people into what he called a — quote — “great modern socialist country” over the next three decades.
PRESIDENT XI JINPING (through interpreter): Achieving the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation will be no walk in the park, and it will take more than drumbeating and gong-clanging to get there. The whole party must be prepared to make more arduous, strenuous efforts.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Susan Shirk is chair of the 21st Century China Center at the University of California, San Diego.
SUSAN SHIRK, University of California, San Diego: Xi Jinping has a vision of China’s role in the world that is much more ambitious than anything we have seen before, talking about China kind of moving toward the center of the world and having a lot more influence than it did before.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: In his address, Xi largely ignored the question of political reforms in China, and he didn’t mention President Trump or North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.
But in a rare move, he did acknowledge that with global demand weakening, there were challenges facing China’s export-driven economy.
PRESIDENT XI JINPING (through interpreter): While China’s overall productive forces have significantly improved and in many areas our production capacity leads the world, the more prominent problem is that our development is unbalanced and inadequate.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Xi was one of the first foreign leaders to meet with President Trump.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The relationship developed by President Xi and myself, I think, is outstanding.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: That was decidedly warmer than Mr. Trump’s past criticism of China and its economic and trade policies.
But other U.S. officials are more critical of Beijing’s actions.
REX TILLERSON, Secretary of State: China, while rising alongside India, has done so less responsibly.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson today criticized China’s aggressive displays of economic and military power, particularly its expansion on man-made islands in the South China Sea.
REX TILLERSON: We will not shrink from China’s challenges to the rules-based order, and where China subverts the sovereignty of neighboring countries and disadvantages the U.S. and our friends.
SUSAN SHIRK: I think there are things to worry about in Chinese foreign policy that are mostly related to these maritime sovereignty issues and to a kind of bullying in Asia, but the global ambition could turn out to be positive.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Susan Shirk says China has filled a vacuum left by the United States’ withdrawal from global agreements like the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris climate accords.
Perhaps the most important thing to watch for in the next few days is who Xi establishes as his likely successor.
SUSAN SHIRK: That is why there is a lot of speculation now that he may be trying, much like Putin, to stay on beyond his normal term or to rule behind the scenes even after he retires.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: President Trump will be traveling to Beijing to meet Xi next month.
For the PBS NewsHour, I’m William Brangham.
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