Sawt Falasteen - China's Xi to get rare airport welcome from Trump

Trump is laying on extraordinary levels of pomp for Xi's first White House visit in more than a decade, including a lavish state banquet and a military flyover.

But the spectacle appears to be more about maintaining the fragile detente between Washington and Beijing than delivering any major breakthroughs on divisive issues from AI and trade to Iran.

Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said Xi "left Beijing by special plane" Wednesday, accompanied by his wife Peng Liyuan, his right-hand man Cai Qi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, among others.

In a highly unusual move for a US president, Trump and his wife Melania will travel to Joint Base Andrews in Maryland near Washington to personally welcome Xi on the tarmac at 6 pm (2200 GMT).

Tellingly, Xi did not afford Trump the same courtesy for the US president's state visit to Beijing in May. Instead, Trump was greeted at the airport by China's vice president.

- 'Gentleman's agreement' -

When the two leaders sit down for their highly anticipated talks on Thursday, they will be confronting a host of issues led by rising fears that artificial intelligence could threaten the human race.

But with China and the United States racing for AI supremacy there are few expectations of any deal between Trump and Xi to regulate the rapidly advancing technology.

Preliminary talks on Sunday between US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and his Chinese counterpart He Lifeng discussed creating a communication channel for AI concerns, but released little in the way of detail.

The simmering trade war between the world's two largest economies and ever-present tensions over Taiwan are also set to dominate the discussions.

China's negotiating arsenal includes its dominance in the supply of rare earths -- critical materials used for high-tech products that are vital to US manufacturers -- which it used to get Washington to back down on tariffs last year.

On Iran, Trump meanwhile played down the need to bring up allegations that China has been supplying Tehran with satellite imagery for a strike on US troops in the Middle East.

Jonathan Czin of the Brookings Institution said expectations were low for any concrete results apart from possibly prolonging a trade truce agreed when Xi and Trump met in South Korea last year.

"I think there will be some extension of the gentleman's agreement," Czin told AFP.

Analysts said that China had meanwhile begun to look past Trump, whose second term ends in early 2029, and was in many ways playing for time and using the truce to consolidate its position.

- 'Oppressive dictator' -

For Trump, the visit is a chance to focus on pageantry instead of confronting a host of domestic problems including low approval ratings ahead of November's midterm elections and his stalled war in Iran.

US presidents very rarely travel to the airport to greet foreign leaders, although Trump welcomed Russian President Vladimir Putin planeside in Alaska last year.

The last such welcomes at Andrews -- apart from papal visits -- are believed to be John F. Kennedy's welcome for British prime minister Harold Macmillan in 1962, and Dwight D. Eisenhower's for Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1959.

Trump's five-star welcome for the leader of China -- a country he lambasted in his first term on trade and the Covid pandemic -- has drawn criticism within his own party.

Republican Senator Roger Wicker, chairman of the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee, said Tuesday that he would have advised against such a "lavish welcome" for the Chinese Communist Party leader.

"Our commander-in-chief should keep in mind that his guest is a brutal, unelected and oppressive dictator," Wicker said.

Xi's visit will wrap up on Friday morning when the two presidential couples will have tea at the White House and then visit the National Archives, home to the US Declaration of Independence.

K.Hassan--SF-PST