President Trump will welcome Chinese President Xi Jinping at the beginning of his state visit to the United States Sept. 23. In that context two recent cordial gestures are notable, as reported below. Moreover, it was announced by the White House this week that President Trump will personally attend the “State Arrival Ceremony and Welcome” for President Xi, when his plane lands at

At a handover ceremony at the Chinese Embassy in Washington on September 15, cultural relics and palaeontological fossils from the cultural property, art and antiquities program of U.S. Homeland Security were handed over to the Chinese ambassador. The items had been trafficked to the U.S. by smugglers and had been seized by U.S. law enforcement.

While the handover is largely symbolic and is in accordance with agreements that the United States has with China with regard to such artefacts, the handover has been warmly greeted by the Chinese side. “The repatriation marks the latest step to implement the common understandings reached by the two presidents in their meetings in Beijing, and also demonstrates the broad prospects of building a constructive China-U.S. relationship of strategic stability,” remarked spokesman Guo Jiakun at the Foreign Ministry briefing on September 18.