U.S. and Chinese economic leaders meet in Paris, clarifying path to summit between President Trump and President Xi

U.S. and Chinese economic officials began new talks in Paris on Sunday to iron out kinks in the trade truce and chart a smooth path for President Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping at the end of March.

The talks, led by U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, are expected to focus on changes to U.S. tariffs, the flow of rare earth minerals and magnets from China to U.S. buyers, U.S. high-tech export controls and China’s purchases of U.S. agricultural products.

The two countries began talks Sunday morning at the Paris headquarters of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, a U.S. Treasury official said. China considers itself a developing country rather than a member of the 38-member club of mostly wealthy democracies.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamison Greer is also expected to take part in the talks, which continue a series of meetings in European cities last year aimed at easing tensions that threatened a near collapse in trade between the world’s two largest economies.

U.S.-China trade analysts said prospects for a major trade breakthrough at the Paris and Beijing summits were limited because there was little time to prepare and Washington’s focus was on the U.S.-Israel war on Iran.

“I think both sides have a minimum goal of holding talks, so that we can de-escalate the situation and avoid divisiveness and re-escalation of tensions,” said Scott Kennedy, an expert on China economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

President Trump may want to leave Beijing with big promises from China to order new Boeing planes and buy more U.S. liquefied natural gas and soybeans, but he may need to offer some concessions on U.S. export controls to make that happen, Kennedy added.

Instead, President Kennedy said a summit would likely be held that “ostensibly suggests progress, but in reality just leaves the situation as it has been for the past four months.”

Trump and Xi could meet three more times this year, including at the China-hosted APEC summit in November and the U.S.-hosted G20 summit in December, which could lead to more concrete progress.

The US and Israel’s war against Iran is likely to come up at the Paris talks, especially in relation to soaring oil prices and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, from which China obtains 45% of its oil. Bessent said Thursday night it would waive sanctions for 30 days that allow it to sell tankers of Russian crude that ran aground at sea, in a bid to boost supplies.

President Trump on Saturday called on other countries to help protect ships in the Strait of Hormuz after the US government bombed military targets on Kharg Island, an Iranian oil loading hub, and Iran threatened to retaliate.

China’s state-run Xinhua news agency said in a commentary on Sunday that “meaningful” progress in China-US economic cooperation could restore confidence in an increasingly fragile global economy.

The two countries are expected to review their progress in implementing their commitments under the October 2025 trade ceasefire that President Trump and President Xi Jinping declared in Busan, South Korea. The agreement avoided a major escalation of tensions, lowered U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports and suspended China’s strict export controls on rare earths for a year. It also suspended the expansion of the U.S. blacklist of Chinese companies that prohibits them from purchasing American high-tech products such as semiconductor manufacturing equipment.

China also agreed to purchase 12 million tons of U.S. soybeans during the 2025 distribution year and 25 million tons in the 2026 season, which begins with fall harvest. Bessent and other U.S. officials said China had so far fulfilled its commitments under the Busan accord, citing soybean purchases that had met initial targets.

But while some industries rely on exports of rare earths from China, which dominates global production, U.S. aerospace and semiconductor companies are not, and are facing deepening shortages of key materials such as yttrium, used in heat-resistant coatings for jet engines.

William Chou, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute think tank in Washington, said at the Paris meeting that “in the short term, the U.S. priority will be to increase China’s agricultural purchases and China’s access to rare earths.”

Mr. Greer and Mr. Bessent are also bringing new stimulus to the Paris negotiations. It’s a new Section 301 investigation into unfair trade practices targeting China and 15 other major trading partners over alleged excess industrial capacity, which could lead to new tariffs in the coming months. Mr. Greer has also launched similar investigations into alleged forced labor practices in 60 countries, including China, which could result in a ban on certain imports into the United States.

The investigation is aimed at reframing President Trump’s tariff pressure on trading partners after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that his global tariffs under emergency law were illegal. The ruling effectively reduced President Trump’s tariffs on Chinese goods by 20 percentage points, but Trump immediately imposed 10% tariffs worldwide under a separate trade law.

China on Friday condemned the investigation and said it reserved the right to take countermeasures. An editorial in the state-run newspaper China Daily added that the investigation shows unilateral actions that complicate negotiations.

“The new talks are both an opportunity and a test,” Xinhua News Agency said.

“Whether we can make progress in the upcoming talks will depend primarily on the United States. The United States needs to approach the negotiations with a rational and pragmatic mindset, and to act in line with the principles that underpin stable Sino-American economic relations.”