Chinese President Xi Jinping held dozens of quick sideline bilateral meetings with various international leaders over the past several weeks but few were as important as the one with Chile’s Gabriel Boric at the APEC summit in Bangkok on Friday.

President Boric was elected earlier this year and is part of the leftist wave that swept across South American politics with a new slate of leaders who are all eager to forge closer ties with China. But what makes Chile important to China is its location atop some of the world’s largest reserves of lithium — a key ingredient to power electric vehicle batteries.