"Xi Jinping has stressed that China insists on denuclearisation on the Korean Peninsula to firmly safeguard peace and stability on the peninsula and calls for peaceful means to solve problems", according to the CCTV report.
Trump launched a missile strike on Syria late Thursday while meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. It was not immediately clear who initiated the call. "The current goal is to get the Chinese to step up to the plate by showing United States resolve".
The issue should be solved through peaceful means, said Xi, adding his country was ready to maintain communication and coordination with the USA on the matter.
The US strike group - which includes the Nimitz-class nuclear powered flagship aircraft supercarrier USS Carl Vinson - turned toward the Korean peninsula this weekend in response to what a top White House official called a "pattern of provocative behavior".
China's Global Times newspaper said in an editorial that North Korea should halt any plan for nuclear and missile activities "for its own security". It was very important for the two Presidents to maintain close communication, he added.
The president has issued repeated, ambiguous warnings about his willingness to take unilateral actions - a threat that assumed new resonance after he ordered a missile strike against Syria last week over its alleged use of chemical weapons.
But Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Trump should try to persuade China with a stick on trade rather than a carrot.
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The Syrian opposition has reported that Assad's forces have begun flying again from an air base struck last week by USA missiles. Iran has provided crucial military and economic assistance to Assad throughout Syria's six-year civil war.
"Our revolutionary strong army is keenly watching every move by enemy elements with our nuclear sight focused on the US invasionary bases not only in South Korea and the Pacific operation theater but also in the USA mainland", it said.
China's Foreign Ministry said Trump initiated the call.
USA intelligence officials fear that the North's leader, Kim Jong Un, could be preparing a nuclear weapons test in the coming days, possibly to mark the 105th anniversary of the birth of his grandfather, the North's founder Kim Il Sung.
Japan plans to hold joint drills with United States warships that are en route to the Korean peninsula in a military show of force to deter Pyongyang from further provocations, reports said on Wednesday (April 12). The Japanese Maritime Self Defence Force (MSDF) may dispatch several destroyers to conduct the drills with the USA vessel while it passes through Japanese waters in the East China Sea.
One of the people who spoke to Reuters has direct knowledge of the plan, while the other has been briefed on the exercises. MSDF officials did not respond immediately when asked to comment. "Our revolutionary strong army is keenly watching every move by enemy elements with our nuclear sight focused on the U.S. invasionary bases not only in South Korea.but also in the USA mainland", said the state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper.
North Korea's patron, China, which supplies much of its food and fuel, would not look kindly on any such outcome, or on any military action by the United States. The presence of U.S. forces in the region and repeated threats of military action by Washington have on the other hand angered the North.
To convince the Kim government to abandon its atomic weapons program, efforts must be made to create an environment to resume the long-dormant six-party talks among North Korean, Japan, South Korea, China, Russia, and the United States.
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