South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, right, speaks next to Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders’ Meeting in Gyeongju, South Korea, on November 1, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AP
The annual summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum adopted a leaders’ declaration as it concluded on Saturday (October 31, 2025), Chinese state media Xinhua reported.
Leaders of 21 Asian and Pacific Rim nations wrapped up their annual economic forum on Saturday (October 31, 2025) after President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed on a temporary truce in their trade war, generating relief around the world.
A source familiar with the matter also confirmed to Reuters that the joint declaration was adopted.
Xinhua reported that the meeting issued outcome documents, including the 2025 APEC Leaders’ Gyeongju Declaration, the APEC Artificial Intelligence Initiative, and the APEC Framework for Cooperation on Population Structure Changes.
This year’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in the South Korean city of Gyeongju was heavily overshadowed by Thursday’s (October 30, 2025) Trump-Xi meeting that ended with the two leaders dialing back their earlier trade steps and de-escalating their trade tensions.
The high-stakes meeting was arranged on the sidelines of APEC. Mr. Trump, known for his dismissal of multilateralism, quickly left South Korea after reaching deals with Mr. Xi, allowing the Chinese President to steal the limelight at the summit.
During the APEC summit’s opening session Friday (October 31, 2025), Mr. Xi said China would support global free trade and supply chain stability in an apparent effort to position his country as an alternative to Mr. Trump’s protectionist policies.
In written remarks sent to a CEO summit held in conjunction with APEC, Mr. Xi said that “Investing in China is investing in the future.” Mr. Xi met his Japanese, Canadian, and Thai counterparts bilaterally on the sidelines of APEC on Friday (October 31, 2025). He also met South Korean President Lee Jae-myung on Saturday (November 1, 2025) for talks that Seoul officials said would touch on efforts to achieve denuclearisation and peace on the Korean Peninsula.
That agenda at the Xi-Lee meeting angered North Korea, a non-APEC member. North Korea’s Vice Foreign Minister Pak Myong Ho on Saturday (November 1, 2025) slammed South Korea for talking about “its daydream” of realising North Korea’s denuclearisation, saying North Korea will show how such a push is “a pipedream” that can never be realised.
Mr. Trump earlier repeatedly expressed his desire to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during his visit to South Korea, but North Korea hasn’t responded.
Mr. Trump and Mr. Kim met three times in 2018-19, but their nuclear diplomacy eventually collapsed. North Korea has since vowed not to place its advancing nuclear program on a negotiating table, but experts say the North would aim for winning extensive sanctions relief in return for a partial surrender of its advancing nuclear programme.
(Inputs from Reuters, AP)
Published – November 01, 2025 08:11 am IST
