US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping arrived in Peru Thursday for an Asia-Pacific summit where they will likely meet for the last time under a cloud of diplomatic uncertainty cast by Donald Trump's election victory. Air Force One touched down at an air base outside Lima as Xi, who landed hours earlier, was being received at the presidential palace by Peruvian leader Dina Boluarte on the eve of a two-day heads-of-state meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) grouping. The men are due to hold talks Saturday, in what a US administration official said will probably be the last face-to-face between the sitting leaders of the world's largest economies before Trump is sworn in in January.
With the Republican president-elect having signaled a confrontational approach to Beijing for his second term, the bilateral meeting will be a closely watched affair. APEC, created in 1989 with the goal of regional trade liberalization, brings together 21 economies that jointly represent about 60 percent of world GDP and over 40 percent of global commerce. The summit program was to focus on trade and investment for what proponents dubbed inclusive growth.
But uncertainty over Trump's next moves now clouds the agenda -- as it does for the COP29 climate talks underway in Azerbaijan, and a G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro next week. On Thursday, APEC ministers, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, held their own meeting behind closed doors in Lima to set.