WASHINGTON – Chinese and US defence officials had their first known formal contact since Mr Donald Trump returned to the White House, in a meeting that partially coincided with Beijing conducting large-scale military drills around Taiwan. Military officials from the US and China held a maritime safety consultation in Shanghai on April 2 and April 3, according to a statement from the navy of the People’s Liberation Army.

Both sides discussed measures to improve maritime military safety, the statement released on April 3 added.

The Pentagon said in a separate statement that the working-level meetings, attended by representatives from the US Indo-Pacific Command, Coast Guard and others focused “on decreasing incidences of unsafe and unprofessional PLA actions.” Talks between the US and China’s armed forces are a critical indicator of the guardrails in place, even as the The meeting in Shanghai came days after the Trump administration dispatched Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth for his first official trip to Asia for talks with allies to deter what Washington has called China’s assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region administration and Beijing dispute over a litany of topics including semiconductor access, investment and tariffs. In response to Mr Trump’s new tariffs on countries around the world, which imposed steep levies on Chinese exports this week, Beijing vowed retaliation without specifying what actions it would take.

While some government officials in Asian countries worry privately about Mr Trump’s transactional approach to alliances and his willingness to seek deals with global autocrats, Mr Hegseth’s swing through the region provided the clearest indication yet of a US military build-up in Asia. “America is committed to sustaining robust, ready and credible deterrence in the Indo-Pacific, including across the Taiwan Strait,” Mr Hegseth said during his visit to Japan, which has long seen instability around Taiwan as posing a security threat to Tokyo.

The PLA has been carrying a spate of drills in the Indo-Pacific that have included live-fire exercises in international waters off the coast of Australia in February. The moves have been seen as testing the Trump administration’s commitment to regional security. China conducted two days of drills around Taiwan that concluded on April 2, adding to the pressure Beijing is applying to the self-ruled democracy that it sees as part of its territory. BLOOMBERG