Chinese leader Xi Jinping met with Bill Gates on Friday, June 16, state media reported, in the Microsoft Corp. co-founder’s first visit to the Asian nation since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
State broadcaster China Central Television reported that the meeting took place, without providing further details. Then statements were made. “We have always placed our hopes in the American people,” Chinese President Xi Jinping said today to his “American friend” Bill Gates during their meeting in Beijing, as reported by the country’s state media. “You are the first American friend I met in Beijing this year,” Xi told Gates, according to People’s Daily. “We have always pinned our hopes on the American people and looked forward to continued friendship between the peoples of the two countries,” Xi added.
Previously, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Beijing city government agreed to donate $50 million each to fight infectious diseases such as malaria. The money is intended for the Global Health Drug Discovery Institute, according to a statement from the Gates Foundation. The institute is a non-profit organization founded in 2016 by the Gates Foundation, the Beijing municipal government and Tsinghua University. In a speech Thursday at the institute, Gates congratulated China on eliminating malaria in within its borders. He also praised Chinese scientists for working to fight the disease around the world, according to a statement released by the Gates Foundation.
Gates – reports Bloomberg – also met with Beijing Mayor Yin Yong on Thursday, according to the Beijing Daily. Yin credited the institute for making “breakthroughs” in recent years and promised continued support. In a tweet Wednesday announcing his arrival in Beijing, Gates said he was “excited to visit partners working on global health and development challenges” with the Gates Foundation. The Gates Foundation said the global health institute’s mission was to address a specific disparity for countries that “carry 90 percent of the global infectious disease burden, but only 10 percent of global R&D spending.” of drugs goes to diseases that disproportionately affect those populations.”
The last meeting between Xi and Gates was in 2015, when the two met on the sidelines of the Boao forum in Hainan province. In early 2020, Xi wrote a letter to Gates thanking him and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for pledging assistance to China, including $5 million for the country’s fight against COVID-19.
Several foreign chief executives have visited China since it reopened earlier this year, but most have mainly met with government ministers, Reuters noted.