Chinese President Meets ‘Old Friend’ Bill Gates, Says ‘China Always Placed Hopes In American People’

International

oi-Prakash KL

Amid simmering tensions between the US and China, Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft and co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, met Chinese President Xi in Beijing on Friday.

During their meeting, the Chinese President asked Gates to help promote US-China relations. “I am very happy to see you. We haven’t seen each other for more than three years … and you are an old friend of ours,” Xi said, according to Chinese state media. Xi claimed that Gates was “the first American friend I’ve seen this year.”

“I always believe that the foundation of the US-China relationship is in the people. I am placing my hope in the American people,” the Chinese leader was quoted as saying.

This is the first visit to China by the world’s fifth-richest man since 2019.

In the meeting, the Chinese President appreciated the works carried out by the Gates’ foundation on global poverty reduction, health, development as well as public welfare and charity work.

President Xi also told Gates that China is willing to work with him and his foundation to continue strengthening cooperation in relevant fields, and provide support and help to other developing countries, the Global Times reported. Gates said that he is visiting China for the first time since 2019. Gates is the latest high-profile business titan to visit the country in recent months, Fox Business reported.

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On Wednesday, the Microsoft co-founder tweeted: “I’ve just landed in Beijing for the first time since 2019, where I’m excited to visit with partners who have been working on global health and development challenges with @gatesfoundation for more than 15 years.”

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on Thursday announced a renewed collaboration with the Beijing Municipal Government and Tsinghua University to support the Global Health Drug Discovery Institute (GHDDI) in its efforts to improve health outcomes worldwide through lifesaving therapies for infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and malaria, which disproportionately affect the world’s poorest.

“Over the next five years, the Gates Foundation will provide US$50 million to GHDDI, which will be matched by the Beijing Municipal Government, in order to bolster the institute’s drug discovery capacity. Tsinghua University will also continue to support GHDDI in areas such as building and sharing research platforms, translating research discovery, and developing talent. The commitment was announced after today’s visit by Bill Gates, co-chair of the Gates Foundation, to GHDDI, where he delivered a speech titled, “The Power of Innovation to Solve Global Challenges,” a press release from the organisation said.

This comes at a time when relations between the countries have hit new lows in recent days after a Chinese balloon travelled across the US.