TOI correspondent from Washington: If symbolism is the first language of diplomacy, then US President Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing this week amounted to a geopolitical translation of a changing world order: a confident, ascendant China speaking as an equal — if not superior — power to an American president increasingly eager for accommodation rather than confrontation.

Beijing is arguably the most powerful competitor the US has confronted in its history, one analyst says.

US President Donald Trump's visit to China this week comes as the rivalry between the world's two largest economies is increasingly shaped by economic competition, technological…