Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump held their first phone talks in four years Friday.
According to Trump, he spoke with Xi about TikTok, just hours before the Supreme upheld a law set to ban the social media platform in the United States in less than 48 hours.
Trump said on his Truth Social platform: “I hope we resolve many disorders together, right away. “
“We have discussed the advertising balance, Fentanyl, Tiktok and many other subjects. President XI and I will do our so that the global is not more violent and safer!”
The call between Trump and Xi took a stand on Friday just before the Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Friday to uphold a federal law banning TikTok unless its China-based parent company, ByteDance, sells the app by Sunday. Ties to China pose significant national security dangers, outweighing considerations about TikTok’s lax speech and its 170 million American users.
A Tiktok sale does not seem imminent. Even if existing users will retain the application after access to the force of the law on January 19, new downloads and updates will stop to be available. The Ministry of Justice observed in judicial archives that would eventually make the application unusable.
The move marks a significant escalation in US efforts to address similar security considerations to foreign generation platforms.
The call also occurs when the Chinese say that it has been “forced” to expand nuclear weapons, since an American official has issued a caution on the mass destruction weapons program of China.
The state-run broadcaster of China Central Television (CCTV) reported that the verbal exchange between Trump and Xi took place “on the evening of Jan. 17,” and other major points of the discussion were not promptly provided.
During his first term, Trump took a difficult stance against China, launching a protracted industry war that imposed hefty price lists on Chinese imports and reshaped economic relations between the world’s two largest economies.
Trump threatened to impose 60 % customs tariffs on all Chinese imports in the United States. But in the future he also altered his relations with XI and warned that China could simply arbitrate foreign crises such as war in Ukraine.
The phone call marks a notable moment of engagement between the two leaders.
Trump said in a December interview on Meet the Press that he had been communicating with Xi since he won the election. Trump in the interview said he has “a very good relationship” with China’s leader. He said they did had not discussed Taiwan but discussed other issues.
The video watcher said in a press release: “We are in a position to discuss and communicate with the new U. S. administration, properly manage differences, expand mutually favorable cooperation, and promote stable, healthy, and sustainable China-U. S. relations. “”
“China has viewed and evolved China-US relations in accordance with the principles of mutual respect, non-violent coexistence and win-win cooperation. “
Beijing announced that same day that XI sent Vice President Han Zheng to attend China in taking Trump’s possession on Monday, January 20.
This is a nearby story and will be updated with more information.
Update: 1/17/25, 11:03 a.m.: This article has been updated with additional information.
Barney Henderson is Newsweek’s Content Editor, based in London, U.K. Barney joined Newsweek from The Times of London, and previously worked for The Daily Telegraph of London for 13 years, and The Hindustan Times in Mumbai, India. He is a graduate of both King’s College, London, with an MA in Terrorism, Security & Society, and Nottingham University, with a BA in History. You can get in touch with Barney by emailing [email protected].