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South Korea’s new president will host leaders of 20 countries for the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, where the US and Chinese leaders are set to hold a high-level meeting.
two day anniversary festival APEC summitWhich will open in Gyeongju on Friday, there is a possibility of testing lee jae myungTheir diplomatic capabilities face difficult foreign policy challenges.
Lee, who has been in office for less than five months, seeks to get along with friends and rivals alike with his self-proclaimed “pragmatic diplomacy.” But prospects for greater cooperation with Washington and Tokyo are in doubt because of Trump’s tariff war and the election of a new ultraconservative leader in Japan. Tensions remain with North Korea after Pyongyang rejected Lee’s offer and instead strengthened ties with Russia and China.
Lee is expected to hold a one-on-one meeting with the US President in Gyeongju donald trumpChinese President Xi Jinping and the new Japanese Prime Minister Sanae TakaichiWhile chairing APEC events.
Experts say the summit may offer a positive outlook for Lee, but it does not guarantee long-term diplomatic success.
A joint declaration and US-China tensions
This year’s APEC summit, the first in South Korea in 20 years, is overshadowed by Thursday’s Trump-Xi meeting, the outcome of which is expected to have a major impact on the global economy. Trump likely won’t attend APEC’s main summit, but experts say Lee could still engage with other countries to promote free trade and multilateralism.
South Korean officials say they are holding ministerial-level communications with other countries to push all 21 countries to issue a joint declaration at the end of the summit, in an effort not to repeat the failure to reach one in Papua New Guinea in 2018 due to the US-China discord over trade.
“Of course, there are some pending issues, but many have been resolved. We are making efforts towards adopting the ‘Gyeongju Declaration’ and acting as a mediator between the US and China,” South Korea’s national security director Y Sung-lak told local broadcaster KBS on Sunday.
America and Japan
Top South Korean officials have been flying in and out of Washington recently to finalize a trade deal with the US, but it is unclear whether the two countries can hold a meeting in time for the APEC summit.
South Korea’s trade minister, Kim Jung-kwan, told lawmakers on Friday that Washington and Seoul are “sharply divided” over how much of South Korea’s $350 billion US investment package should be provided as direct cash payments under a July agreement aimed at avoiding the Trump administration’s highest tariffs.
There are also concerns that South Korea’s relations with Japan could sour due to the recent inauguration of Takaichi, who holds right-wing views on his country’s wartime aggression.
Relations between the Asian neighbors and their trilateral military cooperation with the US have improved in recent years. But Seoul-Tokyo ties have faced repeated setbacks in the past due to grievances stemming from Japan’s past colonial rule over the Korean Peninsula. There are also questions about whether the trilateral Seoul-Tokyo-Washington partnership will continue to grow amid Trump’s “America first” policy.
Kim Tae-hyung, a professor at Seoul’s Soongsil University, said there is more potential to strengthen cooperation between Seoul and Tokyo as they both struggle to deal with Trump’s unilateral pressure to reset the global trade order and US security commitments towards them.
South Korea’s deputy national security director Oh Hyunjoo told reporters on Monday that there would not be enough time to hold a trilateral meeting with Lee, Trump and Takaichi.
Efforts to resume talks with North Korea
The resumption of diplomacy between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would potentially help Lee reconcile with North Korea.
During the election campaign, Lee said he would support Trump’s efforts to restore diplomacy with Kim, saying that improved relations between Pyongyang and Washington could allow aid projects for the impoverished North that would potentially require South Korean funding.
En route to Asia, Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Friday that he was open to meeting Kim, saying he had a “very good relationship” with him. North Korea has not responded, but Kim suggested last month that he might meet Trump again if the United States withdrew North Korea’s denuclearization as a precondition for talks.
Oh said Seoul sees little chance of a Trump-Kim meeting on the sidelines of APEC. But he said South Korea would have contingency plans ready if the two leaders decide to meet in the future. Their third and last meeting was held in the inter-Korean border village of Panmunjom in June 2019, a day after Trump posted a tweet message inviting Kim to the border.
Chinese–korean relations
Xi’s visit will be his first to South Korea in 11 years. Observers say Lee may try to boost economic and other ties with China, South Korea’s biggest trading partner.
China, locked in rivalry with the United States, likely sees the need to improve relations with South Korea and Japan. This potentially gives South Korea greater diplomatic leverage and allows it to more effectively manage its relations with Washington, Beijing and Tokyo, said Jeonghun Min, a professor at the National Diplomatic Academy in Seoul.
“(South Korea’s approach) is to strengthen cooperation with the US on a strong alliance and, on that basis, manage relations with China and other major countries,” Min said. “The presence of leaders of all major countries at this APEC summit provides a good opportunity to pursue such pragmatic diplomacy.”