Trump, Xi likely to talk soon on minerals trade dispute
US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping will talk soon to resolve trade issues including a dispute over critical minerals, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday.
Trump on Friday accused China of violating an agreement with the US to mutually lift tariffs and trade restrictions on critical minerals.
"What China is doing is they are holding up products that are critical to the industrial supply chain of India, Europe. And that's not what a reliable partner does," Bessent said in an interview with CBS' "Face the Nation."
"I'm confident that when President Trump and Party Chairman Xi get on the phone, this will be resolved. But the fact that they are holding up some products that they agreed to release during our agreement — maybe that's a glitch in the Chinese system, maybe that's intentional. We'll see after the President talks with the party chairman."
Trump said Friday he was confident he would talk to Xi. China said in April that the two leaders had not spoken recently.
Asked if Trump would hold talks with Xi, Bessent said, "I'm confident we'll see something soon." White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett said there was no firm date for the talks, but there had been some discussion that the leaders would discuss last month's Geneva agreement on some of the tariff disputes.
"President Trump, we expect, will have a great conversation about trade negotiations this week with President Xi. That's our expectation," Hassett said.
Source: Investing.com
