Trump says Asia held hostage by N Korea’s ‘twisted fantasies’
When addressing CEOs at APEC, President makes several references to ‘IndoPacific’, a new term that signals the shift in priorities of US
DANANG, VIETNAM : US President Donald Trump on Friday said the Asia-Pacific region was being held hostage by the “twisted fantasies” of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, as he called on countries to stand united against Pyongyang.
“The future of this region and its beautiful people must not be held hostage to a dictator’s twisted fantasies of violent conquest and nuclear blackmail,” he said during a speech in Vietnam to the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum. The region, he added, must “stand united in declaring that every single step the North Korean regime takes toward more weapons is a step it takes into greater and greater danger”.
The US administration thinks China’s economic leverage over North Korea is the key to strongarming Pyongyang into halting its nuclear weapons and missile programmes.
On Thursday, Trump was in Beijing meeting President Xi Jinping, where he called on China to “act fast” over North Korea.
Washington has also worked in recent months to convince allies across Asia to oppose Pyongyang, an issue that will remain prominent during his two-day trip to Vietnam, which is currently hosting a major regional summit.
The leaders of Japan, Russia, China and South Korea are also attending the APEC summit.
PRAISES MODI, INDIA’S ASTOUNDING GROWTH
Trump on Friday also singled out India’s success story for praise as he spoke of the US forging a new partnership with countries in Asia to promote prosperity and a free and open Indo-Pacific region.
Though he was addressing CEOs on the margins of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit at Danang in Vietnam, Trump’s speech was peppered with repeated references to the “Indo-Pacific”, a new term coined by his administration to signal a shift in its priorities in the region. He noted that countries in the broader region outside the APEC grouping were “making great strides in this new chapter for the Indo-Pacific”.
India, he said, was celebrating the 70th anniversary of its independence as a “sovereign democracy as well as, think of this, over 1 billion (people) – it’s the largest democracy in the world”.
“Since India opened its economy it has achieved outstanding growth and a new world of opportunity for its expanding middle class,” he said. “And Prime Minister Modi has been working to bring that vast country and all of its people together as one and he is working at it very, very successfully indeed.”