2 hours agoIn this photo released by Xinhua News Agency, Chinese President Xi Jinping, center, walks with representatives from American business, strategic and academic communities at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, March 27, 2024. – China’s nationalist leader Xi Jinping has called for closer trade ties with the U.S. during a meeting with top American business leaders in Beijing that comes amid a steady improvement in relations that had sunk to the lowest level in years.
Participants at the meeting included Stephen A. Schwarzman, the billionaire head of investment firm Blackstone., and the Biden administration has shown little sign of moderating punitive measures against Chinese imports imposed by his predecessor and assumed rival in the November polls, Donald Trump.
China's economy has been bogged down by a crisis in its property market in which builders are struggling under mountains of debt and buyers are paying off loans on apartments that may never be completed. Other issues, such as an aging population and high youth unemployment, are prompting China's leaders to lean more heavily on boosting export manufacturing to make up for weak demand at home.
But Xi's administration has maintained a hard line on issues it considers its “core interests.” Those include its claims to virtually the entire South China Sea, the self-governing island democracy of Taiwan — a close American ally — and its heavy-handed rule of outlying regions such as Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang.