MBABANE:United States(US) President Donald Trump has said that his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping has assured him that Beijing will not attempt to unify Taiwan with mainland China while the Republican leader is in office, Aljazeera reported this week.
Trump said on Sunday that the long-contentious issue of Taiwan “never even came up as a subject” when he met with Xi in South Korea on Thursday for their first face-to-face meeting in six years. The meeting largely focused on US-China trade tensions.
“He has openly said, and his people have openly said at meetings, ‘We would never do anything while President Trump is president’, because they know the consequences,” Trump said in an interview with the CBS 60 Minutes programme that aired on Sunday.
Asked in the interview whether he would order US forces into action if China moved militarily on Taiwan, Trump demurred.
The US, under both Republican and Democratic administrations, has maintained a policy of “strategic ambiguity” on Taiwan-trying not to tip its hand on whether the US would come to the island’s aid in such a scenario.
“You’ll find out if it happens, and he understands the answer to that,” said Trump, referring to Xi.
But Trump declined to spell out what he meant in the interview conducted on Friday at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, adding: “I can’t give away my secrets. The other side knows.”
US officials have long been concerned about the possibility of China using military force against Taiwan, the self-governed island democracy Beijing claims as part of its territory.
US President Donald Trump, left, and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands before their meeting at the Gimhae airport in Busan, South Korea, on October 30, 2025 [Mark Schiefelbein/AP]