Trump eyes China deal, but dragging out talks risks backlash, warns former diplomat

US President Donald Trump is expected to aim for an “economic deal” with China when he is in Beijing, according to a former senior diplomat who served under the American leader during his first term. However if Beijing were to drag out trade negotiations with Washington for too long, it could risk Trump taking a much tougher turn against China, warned Stephen Biegun, who served as US deputy secretary of state from 2019 to 2021. “The president wants a deal, an economic deal, specifically,” he said on Wednesday during an event in Melbourne held by the Australian think tank, the Lowy Institute, when asked what Trump hoped to achieve from his delayed China trip. “The only thing that … is debatable is whether the Chinese give it to him all at once or portion it out over the next three years to keep the negotiation going, to keep the United States tied in this engagement,” he added. Biegun’s comment came hours before Trump announced that his high-stakes visit to Beijing to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping had been rescheduled to take place on May 14 and 15. Washington initially said the trip was scheduled for March 31 to April 2, but Beijing did not issue an official confirmation. Trump then said it was postponed as the war on Iran took priority, while the Chinese government stated the two sides were still discussing the trip. Asked whether the Xi-Trump summit depended on the end of the US-Israel war on Iran, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said on Wednesday that the two leaders had discussed rescheduling. She added that the Chinese leader understood it was “very important” for the president to stay in the US “throughout these combat operations”. In an effort to set the stage for the long-awaited meeting between the leaders of the world’s two largest economies, China and the US concluded their sixth round of trade talks in Paris last week. Both sides agreed to “continue to maintain the stability of tariffs” and discussed the possibility of establishing a mechanism for promoting bilateral trade and investment, according to Li Chenggang, Chinese commerce vice-minister and one of Beijing’s lead negotiators in the two-day talks. Speaking at the Lowy event, Biegun said he expected the agreement sought by Trump to include Chinese commitments to “large” purchases of US agricultural and manufacturing goods, as well as eased market access for American investors. He added that it would also include a commitment by Beijing to “invest massive sums” in the US. However, he cautioned that views on China had become so hostile in the United States that this investment promise “would lead to a backlash if … it is not at the federal level [but] at the local level in the communities”. Biegun also said he did not expect the deal to lead to a permanent restructuring of China’s economic practices. He said the “structural challenges” posed by China to other economies were “not just out of malice but just because of the sheer scale” of the country. “As I look through the history of trade policy, there’s nothing that China is doing that hasn’t been done by other countries – stealing technology, setting ownership restrictions on investors,” he said. “What’s new is it’s never been done by a country this big. And that makes it a special kind of problem.” Beijing has repeatedly denied stealing US technology, saying such claims were politically motivated and aimed at containing China’s development. “Whether that’s fair or unfair, it’s something that really needs to be addressed if we’re going to create a stable and balanced global trading system. And this is not on the table,” Biegun added. He also said China was pursuing an “obvious” strategy in its trade negotiations with the US. “They wanted to start the negotiation quickly. They want to end it slowly. They want this thing to last four years if they could,” he said. “But at a certain point, they risk a backlash from the president if he feels like he’s being diddled along by the Chinese. And so they have to calibrate that on their own.” During his speech, Biegun also noted that one of the Trump administration’s “basic goals” was to partner with other countries to unlock sources of the critical minerals necessary to support modern technology, “especially those outside the control of China”.

Trump eyes China deal, but dragging out talks risks backlash, warns former diplomat

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}US leader is likely to ask Beijing to commit to ‘large’ purchases of American agricultural and manufacturing goods, says Stephen Biegun

US leader is likely to ask Beijing to commit to ‘large’ purchases of American agricultural and manufacturing goods, says Stephen Biegun