BOAO, China (AP) — Major multinational companies appealed gingerly to Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday to reduce barriers to doing business in China’s heavily government-directed economy, drawing a commitment to create a more level playing field.

In a rare audience with the head of the Communist Party, executives from Pepsico, Samsung Group, Volvo Group and more than a dozen other companies — from agri-businesses to finance — traded handshakes with Xi while carefully broaching the problems that have bedeviled business success in the world’s second largest economy. They complained about red tape and restrictions on investment that favor Chinese state firms and outright discrimination because of political problems.

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