Washington, 17 March 2026 (dpa/MIA) - US President Donald Trump has requested to delay his planned visit to Beijing due to the war in Iran, he said on Monday.

Trump was expected to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the end of March.

However, the US had now requested the trip be delayed, Trump told reporters at the White House.

"Because of the war, I want to be here. I have to be here, I feel. And so we've requested that we delay in a month or so, and I'm looking forward to being with them," he said.

On Sunday, Trump hinted that the US might delay the trip to China if Beijing did not help unblock the Strait of Hormuz.

"I think China should help too because China gets 90 per cent of its oil from the Straits [sic]," the Financial Times quoted Trump as saying. "We'd like to know before that. It's [two weeks is] a long time."

However, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent then told CNBC the trip could be delayed due to logistics.

Trump and Xi last met in October in South Korea on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, where they agreed, among other things, to a temporary pause in their ongoing trade war.

However, tensions persist over issues such as China's exports of rare earths and US exports of advanced computer chips.

Chinese and US trade representatives held a fresh round of talks in Paris over the past two days. The Paris talks are the sixth round between the two sides since the start of Trump's second term in January last year.

Photo: EPA