Monday 03/November/2025 – 01:50 PM
Chinese President Xi Jinping sparked a wave of laughter when he joked with his South Korean counterpart Lee Jae-myung about the possibility of spyware in the Chinese smartphones he gave him as a gift, in a rare scene that showed an unusual side of the Chinese leader known for his reserve.
China and South Korea
During an official banquet held on the sidelines of the APEC summit in the South Korean city of Gyeongju, Xi presented Lee with two Xiaomi phones equipped with screens manufactured in South Korea, according to the British newspaper The Guardian.
The Korean President laughingly asked if the communication lines in those devices were secure, and the Chinese President responded with a smile, calling for checking whether there was a back door, referring to hidden programs that might allow a third party to monitor the devices.
The Chinese President’s sarcastic response sparked a wave of laughter and applause from the audience, and also made headlines in Korean newspapers, with the Seoul Shinmun newspaper describing the scene as a rare moment in which the Chinese President showed a sense of humor, especially on a sensitive topic such as cybersecurity and espionage.
This funny exchange comes at a time when the United States warns that Chinese phones and applications may contain backdoors that could be exploited to penetrate other countries’ systems, while Beijing categorically denies its involvement in any electronic espionage activities.
The friendly meeting between the two leaders attracted widespread attention in South Korea, especially since the Chinese President rarely shows public wit. Korean presidential spokesman Kim Nam-joon said that the moment was evidence of the harmony that prevailed in the meetings of the two leaders during the two-day summit, adding that this kind of banter would not have happened without the friendly atmosphere that brought them together.
The Chinese President did not leave empty-handed, as his South Korean counterpart presented him with a group of gifts, including a hand-carved “Go” board and a mother-of-pearl tray, a gift that impressed the Chinese President, who described it as wonderful, according to what was reported by South Korean media.
The footage that documented the situation in Gyeongju received great interaction on the Internet, with one user likening the scene to a duel between martial arts masters with words.
This situation is one of the few moments in which the Chinese President appears spontaneously in front of the cameras, after a similar incident last September when an open microphone captured a side conversation between him and the leaders of North Korea and Russia about biomedicine and longevity during a military parade in Beijing.
