US ambassador says Trump asked Xi if China would buy American weapons

US President Donald Trump asked Chinese leader Xi Jinping whether China would be interested in purchasing American weapons during Xi's visit last week, the US ambassador to China, David Perdue, said Sunday, according to the Guardian.

Perdue made the comments in an interview with Fox News, though further detail on Xi's response or any follow-up discussion was not immediately available. The remarks emerged as a Taiwanese minister separately described what they called a "severe" military threat posed by Beijing to Taiwan, the self-governing island that China claims as its own territory.

The reported exchange between Trump and Xi comes amid a broader backdrop of US-China relations that have included both trade negotiations and long-running tension over Taiwan. Washington has historically been a major arms supplier to Taiwan, a relationship Beijing has repeatedly objected to.

Neither the White House nor Chinese officials had publicly confirmed additional details of the conversation at the time of Perdue's remarks. The report adds another data point to the closely watched dynamic between the two governments following Xi's visit.