By Ashok Nilakantan Ayers
WASHINGTON: As the 81st UN General Assembly debates the future of multilateralism in New York, Donald Trump and Xi Jinping are confronting the harder reality of great-power rivalry in Washington—trade, tariffs, AI, Taiwan, Iran and the question of who sets the rules of the international system.
The geography tells an important part of the story. While presidents, prime ministers and foreign ministers gather in New York for the 81st United Nations General Assembly, Chinese President Xi Jinping travelled to Washington for a state visit with President Donald Trump.
China, one of the UN Security Council’s five permanent members, is represented at the General Assembly by its foreign-policy establishment, including Foreign Minister Wang Yi, while Xi is dealing directly with the American president.
The two settings could hardly be more different. At the UN, 193 countries sit together in an institution built around collective decision-making. In Washington, the world’s two largest economic powers are trying to manage a relationship in which cooperation and confrontation have become inseparable.
The theme of this year’s General Assembly—“Restoring Trust, Managing Transformation: A United Nations That Delivers for All”—could almost serve as a description of what Trump and Xi are attempting bilaterally. But the Washington summit is also a reminder of the limits of the UN system. Decisions on the most consequential questions of war, trade, technology and strategic competition increasingly depend on negotiations between major powers, particularly the United States and China.
Trump’s reception of Xi began with an unusually personal gesture. He travelled to Joint Base Andrews on Wednesday to greet the Chinese president, before the two leaders met formally at the White House on Thursday. The White House describes Xi’s visit as a significant milestone in the relationship. It is Xi’s first White House visit in more than a decade and only the eighth major state visit by a Chinese leader to Washington in nearly half a century.
The ceremony is deliberately grand: military honours, a review involving US troops and aircraft, restricted and expanded bilateral meetings and a White House state dinner attended by senior officials and business leaders.
Yet behind the ceremonial warmth lies a relationship that remains deeply competitive. An assessment quoted by Al Jazeera described Beijing’s approach as “cautious”: China wants to stabilise a relationship it cannot afford to sever, while also avoiding a direct confrontation with Washington. That may be the central calculation behind the summit. Neither Trump nor Xi needs a new crisis. Neither is prepared to abandon the strategic competition.
Trade remains the most tangible item on the table. The tariff war that erupted during Trump’s second term rapidly escalated, with both sides imposing punitive measures and Beijing using its control over critical rare-earth supplies as leverage. The two governments eventually reached a truce after Trump and Xi met in South Korea in October 2025. That arrangement was due to expire in November but has now effectively been extended into January, giving negotiators additional time.
That extension may itself be the most important immediate outcome. It buys both governments time. For Trump, tariffs remain a negotiating instrument. For Xi, avoiding another uncontrolled escalation protects Chinese exporters and the wider economy while preserving Beijing’s ability to retaliate.
The broader question is whether the two countries can move from repeated tariff truces towards a durable commercial framework. There are signs of bargaining already. Earlier discussions included Chinese purchases of Boeing aircraft and American agricultural products and plans for a Board of Trade and Investment.
But the underlying disagreements have not disappeared. Washington remains concerned about China’s industrial capacity, technology policies, market access and supply-chain dominance. Beijing objects to what it regards as American attempts to contain China’s economic and technological rise. Thus, trade is not merely about tariffs. It is increasingly about economic security.
One of the least visible but most consequential elements of the relationship is China’s dominance of important rare-earth supply chains. For Washington, reducing dependence on Chinese supplies has become a strategic objective. An analyst cited in the Al Jazeera live coverage said the administration’s less aggressive posture towards China could partly be designed to “buy time” to reduce Chinese dominance of rare-earth supply chains.
That makes the summit more complicated than a conventional trade negotiation. The United States can impose tariffs on Chinese goods. China can respond through export controls on strategically important materials. Both sides therefore possess economic weapons that can damage the other. The likely objective is not to eliminate those weapons but to establish rules for using them without allowing the relationship to spiral.
Artificial intelligence may be the most consequential subject after trade. The United States and China are competing for leadership in frontier AI, while their technology industries increasingly overlap with national-security concerns. Washington is worried about the transfer of advanced technology to China, Chinese development of AI capabilities and what US officials see as risks to national security. Beijing, meanwhile, wants access to technology and markets while resisting restrictions that could slow its technological rise.
Yet there is a paradox. Both governments recognise the dangers of uncontrolled AI development, but neither appears willing to surrender its competitive advantage. Trump has said he wants to leave the existing AI situation “exactly where it is”, while the two countries have discussed a notification mechanism for serious AI incidents that could threaten national security.
That suggests the summit may produce dialogue rather than an AI arms-control treaty. The underlying competition remains. The two countries control much of the world’s frontier AI ecosystem, making cooperation important—but competition makes comprehensive cooperation difficult. One analyst cited in the source material argued that safety arrangements covering only one country’s AI models would leave half the problem unresolved.
Then there is Iran. The US-Israel war on Iran is an issue that Washington cannot separate from its relationship with Beijing. China has maintained close economic and diplomatic ties with Tehran and remains Iran’s largest trading partner, according to the reporting surrounding the summit. Washington may want Beijing to use its influence with Tehran, particularly as attempts at diplomacy have stalled. But Trump has so far resisted making a direct appeal to Xi for help. This is one of the issues that could be discussed privately but remain absent from any celebratory summit statement.
The Iranian question also exposes a larger strategic divide. The United States sees China as a competitor whose economic and diplomatic power can affect American security interests far beyond East Asia. China sees itself as a major global power with relationships that Washington cannot simply dictate. Even reports about Chinese satellite imagery allegedly being used by Iran have added another layer of sensitivity to the relationship. Trump has played down the significance, noting that the US and China conduct intelligence activities against each other.
If trade is the negotiable issue, Taiwan is closer to the non-negotiable category. China regards Taiwan as part of its territory. The United States maintains extensive unofficial relations with Taipei and supplies Taiwan with military equipment. The Trump administration approved an $11 billion arms package for Taiwan in December, according to the supplied reporting, while another package worth about $14 billion has reportedly been held up.
Trump has described arms sales to Taiwan as a negotiating “chip”. For Beijing, however, Taiwan is not simply another bargaining item. Wang Yi has urged Washington to handle Taiwan with “extra prudence” and has framed the broader objective as building what China calls a “constructive bilateral relationship of strategic stability”. This may explain why Taiwan could be discussed extensively behind closed doors but receive relatively little public attention. Both governments have an interest in preventing the issue from becoming the headline outcome of the summit.
Several difficult questions are therefore likely to remain outside the spotlight. Human rights are one.
US lawmakers have already criticised the lavish welcome for Xi and called for discussion of China’s human-rights record, military expansion and relationship with Iran. Democratic lawmakers have separately urged Trump not to weaken American support for Taiwan. American citizens detained in China are another issue. Trump is expected to raise individual cases, following the release of Pastor Ezra Jin after Trump had raised his case with Xi.
The South China Sea, China’s military expansion, cyber activity and the future of US alliances in Asia also form part of the strategic background. None fits comfortably into the optics of a state dinner. That does not mean the subjects disappear. It means they may move into the private negotiating rooms.
This is where New York becomes important. The UN General Assembly is not simply a backdrop to the Trump-Xi summit. It is the arena in which China presents itself as a permanent member of the Security Council and a defender of multilateralism. China’s permanent seat on the Security Council gives Beijing a formal role in questions of international peace and security that is far greater than that of most countries.
The presence of Wang Yi in New York therefore has a significance beyond routine diplomacy. It allows Beijing to pursue two tracks simultaneously: presenting China’s multilateral position at the UN while Xi negotiates directly with Trump in Washington. That dual-track diplomacy is increasingly characteristic of the international system. The UN remains the forum in which all countries have a voice. But great-power bargaining continues to determine what can actually be implemented.
The real significance of the Trump-Xi summit may therefore lie not in whether it produces a dramatic agreement. The more important question is whether Washington and Beijing can establish a mechanism for managing disagreements without allowing every dispute to become a crisis.
Trade needs stability. AI needs communication. Rare-earth supplies need predictability. Taiwan needs strategic restraint. Iran requires diplomacy. And the global economy needs the world’s two largest economic powers to avoid another uncontrolled tariff escalation. That is an ambitious list. Yet neither side appears to be seeking a grand reconciliation. The language emerging from Beijing is revealing: “constructive bilateral relationship of strategic stability”; more areas of cooperation; fewer problems; and better management of risks.
It is the language of coexistence, not friendship. Trump’s approach is more transactional—using tariffs, technology, market access and security relationships as negotiating instruments. The two approaches can overlap, but they are not identical. That is why the White House ceremony may look warmer than the strategic relationship actually is.
The 81st UN General Assembly is asking whether the world can restore trust and manage transformation through multilateral institutions. In Washington, Trump and Xi are confronting the same question in a much narrower and harder form: can two competing powers manage their rivalry without allowing it to destabilise the wider world?
The answer may determine not merely the future of US-China relations, but how much room the United Nations and the broader multilateral system retain to deal with the conflicts and transformations neither superpower can manage alone. (IPA Service)
