Trade accord boosts China

BEIJING — After eight years of talks, China and 14 other nations from Japan to New Zealand to Myanmar on Sunday formally signed one of the world’s largest regional free trade agreements, a pact designed by Beijing partly as a counterweight to U. S. influence in the region.

The pact, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, or RCEP, is limited in scope. Still, it carries considerable symbolic heft. The pact covers more of humanity — 2.2 billion people — than any previous regional free trade agreement and could help further cement China’s image as the dominant economic power in its neighborhood.

It also comes after a retreat by the United States from sweeping trade pacts that reshape global relationships. Nearly four years ago, President Trump pulled the U. S. out of the TransPacific Partnership, or TPP, a broader agreement than the RCEP that was widely seen as a Washingtonled response to China’s growing sway in the AsiaPacific region.

After Trump pulled the United States out of that arrangement, the other 11 countries then went ahead with it on their own. Joe Biden, the presidentelect, has been noncommittal on whether he would join the TPP’s successor.

Because of the pandemic, the signing of the agreement Sunday was unusual, with separate ceremonies held in each of the 15 member countries all linked by video. Premier Li Keqiang, China’s secondhighest official after President Xi Jinping, oversaw the Beijing event. In a statement, he called the pact “a victory of multilateralism and free trade.”

The RCEP encompasses the 10 countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations plus Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea.