WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is set to leave Tuesday for Beijing to meet with President Xi Jinping after weeks of trying, and failing, to persuade the Chinese government to use its considerable leverage to prod Iran to agree to U.S. terms to end the two-month war — or at the very least, reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump has veered between venting that China, the world’s biggest buyer of Iranian oil, hasn’t done more to get the Islamic Republic in line, and acknowledging that Xi’s government helped de-escalate the conflict last month by nudging Tehran back to ceasefire talks when negotiations wobbled.
But ahead of the U.S. leader’s high-stakes visit, the White House has set low expectations that Trump will be able to persuade Xi to change China’s posture.
Instead, the administration seems determined not to let differences on Iran overshadow efforts to make headway on other difficult matters in the complicated relationship — ranging from trade to further Chinese cooperation to block exports of fentanyl precursors.
“We don’t want this to be something that derails the broader relationship or the agreements that might come out of our meeting in Beijing,” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on Bloomberg TV last week.