Saturday, March 29, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping held a phone call on Friday, their first direct conversation since June, as tensions over trade and technology continue to escalate.
The discussion came at a sensitive moment, with Washington pressing Beijing on tariffs, market access, and data security guarantees for TikTok. The Biden administration has threatened to ban the app unless its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, divests its U.S. operations.
China’s state broadcaster CCTV was the first to report the call, though no details of the conversation were released. The White House has so far declined to comment.
According to a U.S. official, the call began at 8 a.m. Washington time. This was Trump’s second direct exchange with Xi since he began his second term in January. On June 5, Trump revealed that Xi had invited him to visit China, and that he had extended a reciprocal invitation for Xi to travel to the United States.
The call is also being viewed as groundwork for a potential face-to-face meeting between the two leaders during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in South Korea, scheduled for October 30 to November 1, Reuters reported.
The renewed communication underscores the fragile state of U.S.-China relations, with both sides seeking to manage disputes over trade, market barriers, and technology security while preparing for high-level diplomacy later this year.
