Trump to visit China this year to boost economic ties

The move comes after the US-China relationship showed significant growth after Trump's first ever meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping last month.

Washington, May 18: US President Donald Trump is likely to visit China this year with an agenda to further improve the economic ties and reduce conflicts between the two countries.

Jinping in his last meeting with US president had said that there were a thousand reasons to make the Sino-US ties work and no reason to break them. He had also invited Trump to visit China during the meeting.

"President Trump is looking forward to and hopefully would be able to reach agreement in areas where we have not been able to reach an agreement today for the strengthening of the US-China relationship which will again allow us to try and reduce as much conflict and create more economic opportunities for the people," a senior Trump administration official said.

While no date has been fixed for the visit so far, it has been in the discussion stage for quite sometime now.

"It's something that we have been discussing. We have been making progress in our discussion. I think the US-China relationship is right now showing signs of really been stronger than it has been in the long time," the official said on the condition of anonymity.

"I think that stems from the fact that President Trump and President Xi (Jinping) were able to spend a lot of time together at mar-a-Lago and find areas where there is a lot of common objectives. I think they have been working together towards those objectives.

"Both are leaders who do not think in short term, but in long term and are trying to create the right framework for the US-China relationship to last for the duration. I would imagine that he would make a trip to China," the official said.

PTI