Jokowi Receives Phone Call From China’s Xi Jinping

Jakarta Globe, Oct 24, 2014

China's President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of People in Beijing on Sept.
18, 2013. (Reuters Photo/Feng Li)

Jakarta. President Joko Widodo on Friday spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping on the phone and was scheduled to speak with United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon later in the day.

News portal Detik.com reported that Xi initiated the call, and that Joko was speaking English when he picked up the phone. Reporters were not allowed to stay in the room for the duration of the call.

“Good morning. Who is speaking?” Joko said, according to Detik.com.

The newly inaugurated president of Indonesia has not yet announced his cabinet lineup, but was said to be focusing on his international agenda on Friday.

The relationship with China has been described as one of Joko’s most important foreign policy challenges, mainly due to China’s assertiveness in staking its claims to large swathes of the South China Sea, including possibly resource-rich Indonesian waters surrounding the Natuna islands.

It was not immediately clear what issues Joko and his Chinese counterpart discussed on Friday.

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