China Confirms First AI Talks With U.S., Eyes Longer Truce

BEIJING: China's Commerce Ministry said on Thursday, Sept. 24, that its senior trade negotiators have held their first talks with the United States on artificial intelligence, and that the two sides also discussed cutting tariffs and extending the trade arrangements they reached in Kuala Lumpur last October, according to a Sept. 24 report by CNBC.

Ministry spokesperson He Yadong made the confirmation at a briefing in Beijing. The timing was pointed. It came only hours before President Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump were due to begin talks in Washington as part of Xi's state visit.

New York Meetings Set the Agenda

The AI discussions took place when Vice Premier He Lifeng met Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in New York in the run-up to the summit. The ministry described those talks as constructive and candid and said the two sides reached "multiple points of consensus." It did not publish details.

Bessent had previewed part of the outcome. Earlier in the week he said the two governments discussed setting up an AI dialogue and a mechanism to warn each other about AI risks. TradeFlock reported at the time that Bessent called his meeting with He Lifeng "successful". Beijing's statement is the first time China itself has said the AI talks happened.

A Truce Pushed Into January

The trade piece is more concrete. On Wednesday, as Xi landed in the U.S., Bessent told Fox News that the two countries had agreed to extend their trade truce to January. TradeFlock covered that two-month extension to Jan. 10 when it was announced.

The truce, first reached in October 2025, kept U.S. tariffs lower and limited China's export controls on rare earths. Those minerals go into semiconductors, many household goods and defense equipment, which is why companies that buy components from China watch the deadline closely. He Yadong's reference to "extending trade arrangements" suggests Beijing is ready to sign off on the longer timeline, though the ministry did not give a date.

Trump Signals He Wants No New AI Rules

Trump said in a Truth Social post early Thursday that AI would be on the table. "A big day with President Xi of China. Super Intelligence (SI) will be a big topic of discussion, but I want to leave it exactly where it is. That is China's position also. Our guardrail is the DOJ!" he wrote.

That line matches what he told the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday: "We're going to encourage it, not rein it in." So the AI channel, at least from Washington's side, looks designed to share warnings rather than to write joint rules.

Both governments do have reasons to talk. CNBC noted that recent incidents involving AI systems have raised fears that more autonomous models could make attacks faster and harder to contain. One example surfaced the same week, when Australia said an OpenAI agent had accessed a government Medicare portal without permission.

What the Talks Leave Out

The ministry's statement said nothing about U.S. export controls on advanced chips, the issue that has defined the technology rivalry for years. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer has said those controls were not on the agenda for these meetings, CNBC reported separately.

For companies, that split matters. A standing AI dialogue and a longer tariff truce lower the risk of a sudden escalation over the next few months. They do not change the rules on which chips and tools can be sold to Chinese buyers. Any firm planning around those restrictions should assume they stay in place until one side says otherwise.

The next markers are the summit readouts. Investors will look for written terms on the truce extension and for any sign that the new AI channel has a schedule, named officials or a first agenda.