1 of 7 | Chinese President Xi Jinping attends the first session of the APEC summit in Gyeongju on Friday. Xi gave a speech promising to protect free trade amid global uncertainty. Photo by APEC 2025 KOREA/Yonhap
World leaders kicked off the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit on Friday, with Chinese President Xi Jinping taking the spotlight to call for multilateralism and free trade one day after his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump cooled off their simmering trade war.
The two-day gathering brings together the leaders of the 21 APEC member economies, along with guest nations and international organizations, to work on an agenda of trade, sustainable growth and regional integration.
During Friday’s first session, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung emphasized the importance of the annual APEC gathering amid a tumultuous global economic environment.
“We are at a critical juncture, where the international order is undergoing a turbulent transformation,” Lee said in his opening remarks. “Cooperation and solidarity are the only sure answers that will lead us to a better future.”
Much of the attention leading up to the summit this week was on the highly anticipated meeting between Trump and Xi Thursday in Busan, where the leaders of the two superpowers addressed several contentious trade issues.
Trump agreed to lower tariffs on China by 10% as Beijing said it would pause export controls on rare earth minerals for a year and resume buying soybeans from the United States. China also agreed to work to stem the flow of precursor chemicals used to make fentanyl.
The U.S. president declared the meeting a “great success.”
“Overall, on the scale of from zero to 10, with 10 being the best, I would say the meeting was a 12,” Trump said.
Tariffs still remain at 47% on China, however, with some analysts and opposition leaders saying that Trump merely tamped down the crisis he created with his so-called “Liberation Day” tariffs.
“[Trump] started a trade war, created a giant mess for American businesses, consumers and farmers,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer wrote on X on Friday.
“And now he’s trying to celebrate how he cleaned up the very same mess he created in the first place,” Schumer wrote. “All while not fixing actual problems we face with China.”
Trump returned to Washington after his meeting with Xi, leaving the Chinese leader on center stage at a multinational forum that represents more than 60% of global GDP and half of world trade.
Xi took advantage of the spotlight on Friday with a speech defending multilateralism and free trade based on the World Trade Organization system.
“We should work together to safeguard the multilateral trading system,” Xi said in remarks calling for greater regional economic integration.
“Currently, changes unseen in a century are accelerating across the world. The international situation is fluid and turbulent,” he said. “The Asia-Pacific faces growing uncertainties and destabilizing factors in its development. The rougher the seas, the more we must pull together.”
Xi is holding a series of key bilateral meetings at APEC with leaders including Japan’s new Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, South Korea’s Lee and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.
“China’s door to the world will not close,” Xi said in his speech. “It will only open wider and wider.”
South Korea, meanwhile, is seeking to produce a “Gyeongju Declaration” at the conclusion of the APEC summit on Saturday, as delegates continue to haggle over language related to free trade. The leaders’ declaration can only be adopted by consensus, requiring unanimous agreement among all members.
On Thursday, Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said during a press briefing that the forum was “very close” to reaching a deal on the declaration.
