U.S. President Donald Trump says his trade talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping went "far better than expected," and he promised to hold off on imposing additional tariffs to allow negotiations to continue.
"The quality of the transaction is far more important to me than speed. I am in no hurry, but things look very good!" he tweeted on June 28 after meeting Xi on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit in Osaka, Japan.
Trump earlier called the meeting "excellent" and said that "we are back on track."
"We won't be adding an additional tremendous amount of $350 billion left which could be taxed or could be tariffed. We're not doing that, we are going to work with China on where we left off to see if we can make a deal," Trump told a press conference.
"We will be continuing to negotiate," he added.
In his tweet, Trump said that China had agreed to buy "large amounts of agricultural products from our great Farmers."
The Chinese Foreign Ministry quoted Xi as telling Trump he hoped the United States could treat Chinese companies fairly.
"China is sincere about continuing negotiations with the United States...but negotiations should be equal and show mutual respect," the ministry quoted Xi as saying.
Trump offered a concession to Xi regarding Huawei Technologies, the world's biggest telecom network equipment maker.
Previously, the U.S. administration has said Huawei is too close to the Chinese government and poses a national security risk.
The U.S. Commerce Department put Huawei on its "entity list," which effectively barred the company from buying parts and components from U.S. companies without U.S. government approval.
But Trump said he did not think that was fair to U.S. suppliers. "We're allowing [Huawei to purchase from U.S. suppliers] because that wasn't national security," he said.
Trump also said the Commerce Department would study in the next few days whether to take Huawei off the banned list.
Still, much uncertainty remains in the costly trade dispute between the two economic giants following the breakdown of talks in May.
Tariffs already in place have cost companies in both countries billions of dollars, raised fears of a global economic slowdown, and led to unsteady stock markets worldwide.
Trump has long complained about China’s trade practices, and the U.S. administration is demanding far-reaching changes from China regarding theft of American intellectual property and the elimination of barriers that U.S. firms and other foreign companies face in the Chinese market.
Beijing says Washington is making unreasonable demands and must also make concessions.
