A select group of world leaders have dined with United States President Donald Trump in South Korea, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
On the sidelines of the APEC summit, just seven were invited to the event at the Hilton Hotel. A large sign in the room declared it was a “special dinner in honour of President Donald J. Trump and state leaders”.
Mr Albanese was seated next to Mr Trump and received a ringing endorsement.
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“We had a great meeting a week ago,” the US president said, referencing Mr Albanese’s trip to Washington last week.
“You’ve done a fantastic job and we’re working together on rare earths, but we’re working on a lot of things together, and it’s all working out very well.”
Last week, the two leaders inked a $3 billion critical minerals deal in Washinton DC, which was part of a broader effort to break Beijing’s stranglehold on the sector.
Mr Albanese’s attendance at the exclusive dinner sheds light on why he cut his trip short to Malaysia, flying to South Korea on Wednesday ahead of the APEC summit.
Other leaders that attended the dinner included those of Thailand, Singapore, New Zealand, Vietnam, Canada, and South Korea.
Mr Trump entered the event with New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, and the men joked about hair.
Anthony Albanese was seated next to Donald Trump, and received a ringing endorsement. (Reuters: Evelyn Hockstein)
Mr Luxon, who is bald, told Donald Trump the last time he had spoken to the South Korean president “he gave me grief about my hair”.
“Your hair is beautiful,” Mr Trump said.
“I thought so,” Mr Luxon replied.
At the beginning of the dinner, the US president praised South Korea for its warm welcome.
“You rolled out a red carpet that was a very good red carpet, a beautiful red carpet,” he said.
According to the South Korean President’s office, the leaders were served Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon, from a winery run by Eric Trump.
Meeting with Xi
The US President has this week visited Malaysia, Japan and now South Korea, discussing trade with all three countries and signing new deals with each.
His highly anticipated meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping will take place on Tuesday.
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World leaders are hopeful that the leaders of the two largest economies can break the trade truce.
Mr Trump said the meeting would take place in the morning and expected it to go for three or four hours.
“We’ve been talking a lot over the last month, and I think we’re going to have something that’s going to be very, very satisfactory to China and to us,” he said.
“I think it’s going to be a very good meeting, I look forward to it.”
He also told South Korea that he would try and talk to North Korea.
“You have a neighbour that hasn’t been as nice as they could be, and I think they will be,” he said.
“I know Kim Jong Un very well, and I think things will work out very well.”
Ahead of the president travelling to South Korea, North Korea said it fired sea-to-surface cruise missiles into its western waters, in another display of its growing military capabilities.