In a tit-for-tat, Asean leaders snub a meeting with US officials following Trump’s absence at summit.
only three turn up after Trump bows out of summit in Thailand
BANGKOK: Several South-East Asian leaders snubbed a meeting with US officials after President Donald Trump decided not to attend a regional summit in Bangkok.
Just three leaders from the 10-member Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean) showed up to yesterday’s session, along with a host of foreign ministers.
Trump has been accused of turning his back on Asian allies for pulling out of a major trade pact, as fellow superpower China pursues its own deals and investment projects in the region.
Washington did not send top officials to the weekend Asean summit, instead dispatching commerce secretary Wilbur Ross and national security advisor Robert O’Brien.
Yesterday’s sparsely attended address stood in contrast to earlier Asean meetings, which had all been attended by most heads of state.
“It’s not appropriate for Asean to send leaders when the US representation is not on parity,” one diplomat in Bangkok said.
Another envoy said: “It’s not a boycott, it’s just that other leaders have other meetings to attend.”
In lieu of Trump’s physical presence, O’Brien read a letter from the president inviting “the leaders of Asean to join me in the United States for a special summit” early next year.
In attendance were the prime minister of Thailand, which is hosting the summit, along with the leaders of Laos and Vietnam, next year’s Asean chair. At other events during the summit, members rallied against protectionism amid fears of dragging global growth made worse by the US-China trade war.
Trump, who attended the 2017 Asean meeting in Singapore – vice-president Mike Pence went to the one in Manila last year – could not come this year as he was busy with campaign events back home, a senior White House official said.
China’s premier and the leaders of India, South Korea and Japan all made an appearance over the weekend, although none of them were expected at yesterday’s US-Asean meeting.
One of Trump’s first moves after assuming office was to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a massive free trade pact that was billed to be the world’s biggest before Washington pulled the plug.
The US withdrawal “was a very strong symbolic act and the trend is continuing,” said analyst Alex Holmes from Capital Economics.
The TPP has since been reborn as a watereddown version without the United States, eclipsed by a China-backed agreement that is slated to be the world’s biggest when finalised.