Trump, Xi and Putin Plan Unprecedented Trilateral Meeting on APEC Sidelines in Shenzhen

The White House confirmed on Friday that the leaders of the United States, China and Russia plan to sit down together on Thursday in Shenzhen, the Chinese tech hub that is hosting next week's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have never held a joint meeting. It would be the first gathering of the heads of the world's biggest nuclear powers.

Analysts say not to expect much. They describe the talks as heavier in symbolism than substance, and a senior U.S. official, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity, said no agreements are expected to be announced. The meeting is meant to serve as a start to nuclear talks among the three leaders. Trump has said it would also give them a chance to discuss the U.S. war with Iran, and his goal of a three-way agreement on nuclear stockpiles.

The arms-control backdrop is stark. The last nuclear pact between Russia and the United States, New START, expired in February, removing caps on the two largest atomic arsenals for the first time in more than fifty years. Russia had called for extending the deal for another year. Trump rejected that and asked instead for a new, improved and modernized agreement that includes China. But Pentagon estimates put Beijing's arsenal at more than 600 warheads, while the U.S. and Russia are each estimated to hold more than 5,000. With its stockpile dwarfed, China has shown little interest in a nuclear pact.

Each leader arrives with something to gain. Xi, by hosting, may see a chance to show off China's growing clout and prestige. For the Kremlin, the meeting is a coveted opportunity to appear a superpower on par with Washington and Beijing. Edgard Kagan, a former U.S. ambassador to Malaysia now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Putin's key aim was signaling a desire to talk with Trump and Xi in a way that suggests they are making decisions on Ukraine, something Ukrainians and Europeans dislike. Beijing, by the account of the reporting, was the least certain about the summit's value.

The meeting could also cost China something. The APEC summit brings 21 economies to Shenzhen, a coastal metropolis that grew from a small fishing village into a global technology and economic hub in a few decades, and the trilateral could overshadow it. Hoo Tiang Boon, a professor of Chinese foreign policy at Nanyang Technological University, said it would run counter to Chinese support for multilateralism and could undercut Beijing's push to portray itself as a defender of free trade. It could also muddy China's argument that a Cold War mentality in the West helped cause Russia's war on Ukraine, and its criticism that the U.S. has undermined international institutions and treaties in how it has fought Iran.

The leaders know one another well in pairs. Putin and Xi have met more than 40 times since Xi became president in 2013 and call each other "dear friend." Trump and Putin have met face to face seven times, most recently in Alaska in August 2025. Trump and Xi have held eight in-person talks, including Xi's September state visit to Washington. Trump has warmed to Xi since a truce in their short-lived trade war last year, despite differences over Iran. He has also courted Putin even as Russia presses its nearly five-year war in Ukraine and deepens military, intelligence and diplomatic ties with Iran.

China is Russia's top trading partner, a relationship that has strengthened since Russian troops entered Ukraine in 2022. As the EU and the West tried to isolate Russia economically, China bought more of its energy and became its principal supplier of key technologies, including high-tech components for weapons industries, ignoring Western demands to stop. Before the invasion, Xi and Putin declared a "no-limits friendship." China officially calls itself neutral and says Kyiv's Western allies helped provoke Russia. Moscow, in turn, has repeatedly backed Beijing's policy on Taiwan. Trump recently struck a diesel deal with Russia, waiving sanctions to allow sales of millions of tons of fuel. He has blamed high energy prices on Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries, though analysts say the Iran war is the main driver of higher crude prices.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has voiced concern that the meeting could become a venue for discussing a Ukraine deal behind Kyiv's back. Some have compared the planning to the 1945 Yalta Conference, where the U.S., Britain and the Soviet Union agreed to divide Germany and Berlin into four occupation zones and finalized plans for the United Nations. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed the comparison, noting that anything agreed in Shenzhen cannot be enforced on others. Watch Thursday for whether Ukraine and Iran come up, and whether anything beyond a start to arms talks emerges.