Trade Talks With China 'Going Very Well', Says Trump

Trade talks with China are going very well, US President Donald Trump said on the eve of his meeting with the visiting Chinese Vice Premier Liu. Liu, leading a high-powered Chinese delegation, held talks with top officials of the Trump Administration led by US trade representative Robert, Lighthizer on a comprehensive bilateral trade.

“We just completed a negotiation with China.  We’re doing very well.  We’re having another one tomorrow.  I’m meeting with the Vice Premier over at the White House. And I think it’s going really well, I will say. I think it’s going really well,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday.

“We had a very, very good negotiation with China. They’ll be speaking a little bit later, but they’re basically wrapping it up, and we’re going to see them tomorrow, right here.  It’s going very well,” Trump added.

The US president is scheduled to meet the Chinese vice premier at the White House on Friday.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the meetings were conducted behind closed doors, and officials only provided a list of broad topics to be discussed. 

Still, business leaders and others following the talks are hoping for possible concessions or “early harvests” toward a future comprehensive deal that could include China offering more agriculture purchases, a joint pact to deter Beijing from devaluing its currency and on the US side, suspending planned tariffs and relaxing export bans against blacklisted Chinese telecom giant Huawei Technologies Co, the financial daily said.

US-China Business Council president Craig Allen, who met Liu in Washington on Wednesday, said China’s top negotiator “seemed to take a very pragmatic view on what could be expected from the US in terms of producing a balanced agreement and noted this would be a process rather than a single deal that would resolve all issues,” the newspaper reported.