The first White House event with the heads of eight countries… Attack on ASEAN with deep economic ties with China
Next week Korea-Japan tour, quad summit… Countdown to the launch of economic cooperation aimed at China
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(Washington = Yonhap News) Correspondent Ryu Ji-bok = US President Joe Biden will hold a special summit by inviting the leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for two days starting on the 12th (local time).
It is evaluated as an effort to strengthen relations with ASEAN, which is geographically close to China amid the intensifying conflict between the US and China, and as an intention to deepen the US Indo-Pacific strategy to contain China.
Eight of the 10 ASEAN member states, including Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, attended the summit.
Myanmar, where the military took power in a coup d’état, was excluded from the invitation, and the president of the Philippines, who had just lost the presidential election, did not attend.
Starting with a welcome luncheon hosted by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on the same day, the leaders will discuss ways to deepen economic cooperation with business leaders in the presence of the US Commerce Secretary and the US Trade Representative (USTR).
President Biden will then host a welcome dinner for the leaders at the White House that evening.
ASEAN leaders are expected to discuss cooperation measures such as maritime cooperation, recovery from the epidemic, and health care with Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Tony Blincoln at the State Department on the 13th.
Vice President Harris also agreed to hold a separate meeting focused on climate change, clean energy and sustainable growth.
President Biden is expected to hold face-to-face meetings with the leaders of the meeting in his spare time.
The last time the US invited ASEAN leaders to the mainland was in 2016 during the Barack Obama administration. In particular, this is the first time the event has been held at the White House.
President Biden was originally scheduled for the summit in late March, but he put so much effort into this meeting that it was postponed to increase the number of countries attending.
He also attended the ASEAN summit for the first time since 2017, although it was video in October last year. It is from the recognition that relations with ASEAN, which had been damaged by his predecessor, former President Donald Trump, must be improved.
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Analysts say that such efforts by the United States started from the awareness of the need to strengthen cooperation with ASEAN countries in order to deter China, the largest strategic competitor.
Although ASEAN countries have friction factors such as disputes over territorial rights in the South China Sea with China, there are many countries that have very close economic ties.
In addition, this meeting is an expression of the will to deal with the Indo-Pacific strategy aimed at China at the same time, although a large part of the US diplomatic and security interest is focused on Europe due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
In fact, following the ASEAN summit, President Biden visited Korea and Japan on the 20th and 24th to hold summits between the US and Japan as well as the Quad summit, which is a consultative body to contain China, planning a schedule specific to the Indo-Pacific. there is.
There is also speculation that an economic consultative body called the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) will be officially launched to check China’s economic territorial expansion during the tour.
While the IPEF is expected to participate in the traditional allies of Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, it is even analyzed that one of the goals of this summit is to persuade ASEAN countries to expand their participation.
The Associated Press evaluated the summit as a broad effort to demonstrate that the United States has not lost its interest and policy focus on the Indo-Pacific while coping with the Ukraine war.
However, there are also predictions that it will not be easy to voice a united voice in the values of the United States like other allies, as there are countries with high affinity with China, and some countries are reluctant to adopt an attitude that is close to either side of the United States and China.
For example, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, who was visiting the US, said at an event on the 11th, “We don’t have to choose between the US and China.”
Kurt Campbell, White House National Security Council Indo-Pacific Coordinator, also said in a think tank interview on the same day that the US and ASEAN are not on the same page on all issues.
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2022/05/13 00:12 Send