BEIJING (Reuters) -China's state planner signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Airbus on deepening aviation cooperation, Chinese state media Xinhua reported on Tuesday.
President Xi Jinping and his French counterpart President Emmanuel Macron released joint statements and reached interdepartmental agreements on several areas including artificial intelligence, the Middle East and agriculture during his trip to France, the Xinhua news agency said.
Airbus is in talks with China over a potentially major aircraft order, two people familiar with the matter have said.
China has historically signalled large jet orders timed to coincide with state visits, but the negotiations between Airbus and China's CASC buying agency are likely to go down to the wire and are not guaranteed to result in a deal, the people said.
Xi was in France to firm up bilateral ties amid wider strained trade tension with the European Union over several investigations targeting China.
Xi and Macron also reached cooperation agreements to strengthen cooperation among small and medium-sized enterprises, Chinese state media reported.
(Reporting by Beijing newsroom; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and Christopher Cushing)
