Trump asks China to help bring Ukraine peace, says he ‘had communication’ with Xi recently
President-elect says in an NBC interview aired Sunday that he had an exchange with Xi last week
US president-elect Donald Trump has suggested that China could play a key role in brokering peace between Russia and Ukraine, in comments that referenced the dramatic collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s 50-year regime in Syria on Sunday.
“Too many lives are being so needlessly wasted, too many families destroyed, and if it keeps going, it can turn into something much bigger, and far worse. I know Vladimir well. This is his time to act. China can help. The World is waiting,” Trump said in a social media post.
In an interview aired later on Sunday, Trump told NBC that he “got along very well” with Chinese President Xi Jinping and that the two leaders had “communication as recently as this week.”
Recorded on Friday, the interview featured Trump talking about the US fentanyl crisis and how he could have prompted Xi to take a harder line against drug trafficking.
“I had an agreement with President Xi, who I got along with very well. We’ve had communication as recently as this week,” Trump said, asserting that had the 2020 US election turned out differently, he could have persuaded China to impose the death penalty on anyone trafficking drugs into the US.
“Not that conversation, but I had other conversations. But in the past, I’ve had that conversation”, Trump said when asked if he had discussed fentanyl in his most recent exchange with Xi.
Later in the interview, Trump said that Taiwan issue was also not discussed. “We have been communicating with each other, like three days ago”, adding “we talked about other things”.
