Trump Invites Chinese President Xi Jinping To Attend His January Inauguration

Donald Trump/PHOTO via Instagram @realdonaldtrump

JAKARTA - United States President-elect Donald Trump invited Chinese President Xi Jinping to attend his inauguration next month.

Launching CBS News, an invitation for the inauguration on January 20 in Washington was issued in early November, shortly after the presidential election on November 5. But it is not clear whether the invitation has been accepted.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trump said in an interview with NBC News he was in good relations with Xi Jinping and the two had recently communicated.

This is unprecedented for a Chinese leader, a major US geopolitical rival, to attend the inauguration of the US president.

Trump has appointed many hardline figures against China to occupy important positions in his upcoming government, including Senator Marco Rubio as foreign minister.

The US President-elect said he would impose an additional 10 percent tariff on Chinese goods unless Beijing does more to stop the narcotics fentanyl trade.

Trump also threatened to impose more than 60 percent of China's goods during the campaign.

At the end of November, Chinese state media warned Trump of his promise to apply additional tariffs to Chinese goods related to fentanyl flows, could drag the two countries with the world's top economies into destructive tariff wars.

Separately on Wednesday, China's Ambassador to the US, Xie Feng read a letter from Xi to the US-Chinese Business Council in Washington. The Chinese leader said Beijing was ready to stay in touch with the US.

"We must choose dialogue over confrontation and mutually beneficial cooperation over zero-sum games," Xi Jinping said in the letter.

Xie said the two countries should not separate supply chains. But Nicholas Burns, the US ambassador to Beijing, said China sometimes tries to cover up challenging and competitive relationships.