(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump on Wednesday plans to meet with Battulga Khaltmaa, the president of Mongolia, a land-locked country the U.S. views as strategically important as tensions rise with the nations sandwiching it, China and Russia.
Trump will discuss a free-trade pact with Mongolia, as well as U.S. investment in mineral deposits including rare earths, according to a senior Trump administration official. The elements are important to the American technology industry and now mostly sourced in China.
The official briefed reporters at the White House on Tuesday on the condition of anonymity.
Mongolia is seeking trade routes that don’t involve China and wants help developing cashmere wool, one of its main exports, into finished products so that it doesn’t have to be shipped to China for processing, the official said. About 90 percent of Mongolia’s trade currently passes through China, according to a second official.
Trump seeks out more allies in the region as the U.S. trade dispute with China intensifies. Earlier on Tuesday, the U.S. president lashed out at Beijing for slashing its purchases of American agricultural products. The country continues to “rip off” the U.S., he said, just as negotiators resumed talks in Shanghai following a three-month impasse.
Mongolia may also be important to the U.S. as it confronts Russia. Relations between Washington and Moscow deteriorated after U.S. officials concluded the country interfered in the 2016 presidential elections and haven’t improved despite Trump’s overtures to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Trump has a warm relationship with Mongolia’s government already; the administration official said that at some point in the past, the country gave the president’s son Barron a horse, which is still in Mongolia. It’s unclear if Barron would be allowed to accept it, the official said.
Mongolia has asked for Barron or someone in the administration to name the pony, the official said, and hinted that the president may do so at his meeting with Battulga.
Source:Bloomberg News
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