US President Donald Trump has reaffirmed the one-China policy in his first phone call with China’s President Xi Jinping after taking office. 
 
 In the Friday morning call that was not announced beforehand, Trump told Xi that he fully respected the importance of the one-China policy and that his administration would adhere to it, the state-run China Central Television reported. 
 
 Trump made the pledge at Xi’s request, according to the White House. 
 
 “The two leaders discussed numerous topics and President Trump agreed, at the request of President Xi, to honour our one-China policy,” the White House said in a statement. 
 
 The one-China policy, which recognises that Taiwan is part of China, has been seen as the basis of Sino-US relations since the 1970s. 
 
 Donald Trump sends letter to Xi Jinping seeking ‘constructive relationship’ with China 
 
 Friday morning’s call was the first between the two leaders since Trump was sworn in as US president in late January. 
 
 The call marked a major shift in Sino-US relations, which entered into a period of greater uncertainty after Trump took office. 
 
 Xi was quoted by state television as saying he appreciated Trump’s reiteration of the one-China policy and hoped to work with his US counterpart to promote the steady development of bilateral ties. 
 
 Both leaders also agreed to keep close communications, state television reported. 
 
 The White House described the call as "extremely cordial” and the two leaders also extended invitations to meet in their respective countries. 
 
 Watch: China commends Trump for his letter to President Xi Jinping 
 
 What is the one-China policy and how did it become the bedrock of Sino-US ties? 
 
 Relations between Beijing and Washington have been markedly strained since Trump’s phone call with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen in December after his election victory. 
 
 The Trump-Tsai call was the first between a US president or president-elect and a Taiwanese leader since Beijing and Washington established diplomatic relations in 1979. 
 
 Beijing has been irked by Trump’s previous remarks on cross-strait ties and has said bilateral relations would be damaged if the US refused to reaffirm the one-China policy. 
 
 Analysts believe the Trump-Xi call, which took place on the eve of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s official visit to the White House, was also aimed at easing tensions with Beijing and minimising a potential fallout from Abe’s second face-to-face meeting with Trump. ||||| After nearly three weeks as president Trump talks to Chinese leader and, when asked, agrees to maintain status quo 
 
 Donald Trump has held his first telephone conversation with the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, since entering the White House, telling the Communist party leader he will not challenge Beijing by upending longstanding US policy towards Taiwan. 
 
 
 
 In a brief statement the White House said the leaders of the world’s two largest economies had held a “lengthy” and “extremely cordial” telephone call on Thursday evening in which “numerous topics” were discussed. 
 
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 “President Trump agreed, at the request of President Xi, to honor our ‘One China’ policy,” the White House said, referring to a diplomatic understanding by which Washington does not challenge China’s claim over Taiwan, a democratically ruled island that Beijing considers a breakaway province. 
 
 In a much lengthier account of the call Xinhua, China’s official news agency, said Xi had vowed to work with Trump’s administration to ensure relations could advance “in a sound and stable manner”. 
 
 
 
 “The two countries are totally capable of becoming good cooperative partners,” Xi was quoted as telling Trump. 
 
 
 
 “Trump said he was glad to talk over the phone with Xi,” Xinhua added, reporting that the two leaders had agreed to “keep close contact with each other” and to “strengthen mutually beneficial cooperation in trade and economy, investment as well as international affairs”. 
 
 
 
 “Both of them expressed their eagerness to hold a meeting at an early date,” Xinhua said. 
 
 Lu Kang, a spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry, told reporters the two presidents were looking forward to meeting in person “at their earliest convenience”, with officials from both countries now working towards such a get-together. “China and the US need to cooperate, and can cooperate in many areas,” Lu said. 
 
 The cordial encounter follows an “unsafe” one on Wednesday in the South China Sea between a Chinese aircraft and a US Navy patrol plane. US Pacific Command spokesman Robert Shuford said on Friday the “interaction” between a Chinese KJ-200 early warning aircraft and a US Navy P-3C plane happened in international airspace but did not say what was regarded as unsafe. 
 
 Shuford said the US plane was on a routine mission and operating according to international law. 
 
 The Chinese defence ministry has not responded to a request by Associated Press for comment. 
 
 Following his shock election in November last year, Trump had infuriated and unnerved Beijing by questioning his administration’s commitment to the “One China” policy and holding an unprecedented phone conversation with Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen. 
 
 His team, which includes several notorious China policy hawks, had also threatened a much harder line against Beijing on issues such as trade and the South China Sea, where Trump has accused China of building a “massive fortress”. 
 
 
 
 On Tuesday some of the world’s leading China specialists had warned that already “precarious” ties between Beijing and Washington could be plunged into a dangerous new era, partly as a result of Trump’s rise to power. 
 
 
 
 Bonnie Glaser, the director of the China power project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) think tank in Washington, said the long-awaited conversation between the two leaders, which had taken almost three weeks to arrange, would calm fears that US-China relations were on the verge of a damaging breakdown. 
 
 “I think the entire region will heave a sigh of relief here,” she said. “One hopes that what this understanding has achieved is to enable the US and China to head off a major crisis.” 
 
 Glaser said she believed China had been holding off arranging a phone call with Trump until it was convinced he would not seek to challenge Beijing over Taiwan. 
 
 “The Chinese were unwilling to have that conversation unless and until they were sure it would resolve this problem,” she said. “There has been ongoing discussion in the Trump administration over the last several weeks about what to do on this issue … It became clear that the relationship would be frozen in the absence of Trump taking a firm position.” 
 
 What is the One China policy? "One China" is an arrangement dating back to the 1970s under which countries can maintain formal diplomatic relations with China or Taiwan, but not both. After the Communists won the Chinese civil war in 1949, defeated Nationalists fled to Taiwan. Both Beijing and Taipei claimed sovereignty over the entirety of China. Taiwan’s official name is the Republic of China. Until 1971, Taiwan held China’s seat at the United Nations and the following years saw a wave of states switch to recognise the Beijing government. The US formally established relations with China in 1979, but maintains informal ties with Taiwan. 
 
 The White House statement said the two presidents had “extended invitations to meet in their respective countries” and that officials from both countries would now engage in “discussions and negotiations on various issues of mutual interest”. 
 
 
 
 “President Trump and President Xi look forward to further talks with very successful outcomes,” it added. 
 
 
 
 Tensions between Washington and Beijing mounted after Trump’s election, with the incoming president angering Beijing by hinting he was considering changing foreign policy on Taiwan unless trade concessions were made. Beijing warned Taiwan was a “non-negotiable” issue after the billionaire said “everything is under negotiation”. 
 
 
 
 Paul Haenle, a veteran US diplomat who is the director of the Carnegie–Tsinghua Centre in Beijing, said he believed secretary of state Rex Tillerson had convinced Trump to pull back from his threats to ditch “One China”. 
 
 “Trump had been toying with the notion of trying to use it to get leverage with the Chinese but was convinced that it was in the US interests to abide by it … Trump was convinced, and rightly so, that the ‘One China’ policy is not something we do because it is good for Beijing. It is in America’s interests. 
 
 “It’s good news and a positive development for the relationship,” Haenle said of the call. “It will allow the US and China to get on to the more difficult issues that really need work such as trade, North Korea and the South China Sea. 
 
 “This will open the door now for the US and China to begin to develop the relationship that will allow them to tackle some of the more difficult and contentious issues.” 
 
 
 
 Shen Dingli, a professor of international relations from Shanghai’s Fudan University who had previously called on Beijing to close its embassy in Washington because of Trump’s threats, welcomed the White House’s concession to Xi. 
 
 
 
 “It is good for the two countries and the Asia-Pacific. Now we can have a predictable relationship.” 
 
 Had Trump followed through on threats to alter US policy on Taiwan he would have caused “big trouble”, he added. “Beijing must feel much relief at the message.” 
 
 Additional reporting by Wang Zhen 
 
 ||||| BEIJING (AP) — The U.S. Pacific Command says a Chinese aircraft and a U.S. Navy patrol plane had an "unsafe" encounter over the South China Sea this week, raising concerns. 
 
 Pacific Command spokesman Robert Shuford said Friday that the "interaction" between a Chinese KJ-200 early warning aircraft and a U.S. Navy P-3C plane took place on Wednesday in international airspace over the waters. He did not say what was unsafe about the encounter. 
 
 Shuford says the U.S. plane was on a routine mission and operating according to international law. 
 
 He said the Department of Defense and the Pacific Command "are always concerned about unsafe interactions with Chinese military forces." 
 
 The Chinese defense ministry has not responded to a faxed request for comment. 
 
 ___ 
 
 This story has been corrected to show that the KJ-200 is not a jet.
– A day after offering belated Chinese New Year greetings, President Trump gave Beijing something more substantial: his assurances that he respects America's long-standing "one China" policy and plans to adhere to it. Trump had his first conversation with China's President Xi Jinping late Thursday and the White House says it was an "extremely cordial" talk, the South China Morning Post reports. "The two leaders discussed numerous topics and President Trump agreed, at the request of President Xi, to honor our one-China policy," the White House said in a statement. The policy, which the US has followed for decades, accepts Beijing's view that Taiwan is a part of China. Trump infuriated China in December when, as president-elect, he spoke directly to Taiwan's president. Analysts say Trump appears to have adopted a more pragmatic approach, possibly because of the influence of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. The phone call is "good news and a positive development for the relationship," Paul Haenle, director of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center in Beijing, tells the Guardian. "It will allow the US and China to get on to the more difficult issues that really need work, such as trade, North Korea, and the South China Sea." The AP reports that the US Pacific Command disclosed Friday that a Chinese aircraft and a US Navy patrol plane had an "unsafe" encounter over the South China Sea earlier in the week.