The U.S. and China immediately began competing in this year’s Asian and Latin American friendships, a day after relaunching their bilateral relationship at a summit between their presidents on the outskirts of San Francisco. At the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit.
US President Joe Biden, the host of the summit, opened the day with a speech at the forum’s business summit to promote his country’s role as an investor in the Asia Pacific region and to present it as a more desirable trading partner than China. Less than 24 hours after meeting President Xi Jinping at Filoli Palace, he pledged that “we are not going to stop being in this region.” He stressed that his country was not seeking to “cut off” from China economically, but to “minimize risks and diversify its options”. “In economic gaming and the protection of your intellectual property.”
Biden recalled that U.S. companies have invested $50 billion in APEC economies so far this year, in sectors such as aviation or clean energy.
Hours later, the White House tenant met with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Seok-yeol on Thursday without giving statements to the press at the end of official working sessions. Along with the Japanese, he addressed humanitarian aid in Gaza and the war in Ukraine, according to the US President’s Office. Biden had already held a trilateral summit in August to strengthen ties with his two major allies in the North Asia Pacific region against China. This Friday he is scheduled to meet with Mexican President Manuel Andrés López Obrador and greet Peruvian President Tina Polwarte as APEC Executive Chairman.
For his part, Chinese President Xi Jinping has turned his attention to Latin America, particularly to countries that lament the region’s disappearance from the radar of US attention, now focusing on the Asia Pacific. Conflict between Ukraine and Israel and Hamas. In one of his first actions on Thursday, before attending the summit, Xi met first with López Obrador and then immediately with Poluarte.
In their meeting, according to a Chinese Foreign Ministry statement, Xi pledged his support for Peru as host of the next APEC summit and urged the two countries to strengthen their economic and trade ties. Greater participation of Chinese companies in Andean country and Peruvian projects.
Join EL PAÍS to follow all the news and read without limits.
Register
Earlier, in his meeting with the Mexican leader – the first between them – the Chinese president promised to take bilateral relations to a new level. The two agreed to deepen their cooperation in the fight against fentanyl trafficking and take steps to reduce the flow of precursors from the Asian country to Mexico, where cartels manufacture the opioid and ship it to the United States. Precisely this type of action to combat the scourge, which kills nearly 100,000 people a year in the United States, was one of the main agreements adopted during a meeting between Xi and Biden on Wednesday at the luxurious Filoli mansion, 40 kilometers away. San Francisco. According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, the two leaders also discussed their countries’ cooperation in infrastructure, finance and electric vehicles.
In addition, Xi met late Thursday with the Japanese prime minister and the leaders of other countries — except the United States — with which Beijing has maintained strained relations over the past decade. relationships. The two leaders have not met face-to-face in the past year, when bilateral ties have been strained by events such as a Chinese ban on Japanese fish after Tokyo began dumping treated water from its plant into the sea in August. The Japanese government condemns the presence of Chinese patrols near islands disputed by the two countries in the East China Sea, known as Senkaku in Japanese and Daoyu in Mandarin.
Xi, who came to the meeting with a weak economy, sought to boost trade ties and investment with Japan, its neighbor and the world’s third-largest economy; Kishida, for his part, wanted to lift the Chinese embargo on fish and release Japanese citizens detained in the People’s Republic accused of espionage. “Japan and China co-exist as neighbors and share the responsibility of contributing to world peace and stability,” the Japanese prime minister stressed at the start of their meeting.
The Chinese president will spend his last day in San Francisco discussing a delicate bilateral relationship: his relationship with the Philippines, a region Beijing claims sovereignty over in the South China Sea. According to Manila, Chinese patrols have in recent weeks harassed the resupply maneuvers of its fleet stationed on the Second Thomas Sandbar, part of the Spratly Islands. area.
“We will get comments from the Chinese president on what can be done to reduce the temperature and not escalate the situation in the West Philippine Sea” (as Manila calls the area), President Ferdinand Marcos announced this Thursday in San Francisco. Marcos, who has promoted closer military ties with Washington since coming to power in June last year, met with US Vice President Kamala Harris this Thursday.
Follow all international information Facebook Y XOr Our weekly newsletter.
