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KUALA LUMPUR: US President Donald Trump attended an Asia-Pacific online summit on Friday (November 20) even as he challenged his electoral defeat, while China’s Xi Jinping used the forum to counter protectionism American.
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting, held practically this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, brings together leaders from 21 economies in the Pacific Basin, representing about 60 percent of global GDP.
China, which reached the summit days after scoring a major victory in a trade pact, has become the main driving force behind the group after the United States began withdrawing from multilateral bodies during Trump’s presidency.
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But Trump made the surprising decision to participate in this year’s event, after not participating in APEC since 2017, and appeared on Friday alongside other leaders via video link.
All but one of the leaders had an official APEC backdrop on their screens, which was blue and featured the huge green-domed office of the Prime Minister of Malaysia.
The exception was Trump, who appeared with a beige background under the US presidential seal.
A source involved in organizing the summit said Trump refused to use the official backdrop.
He delivered a speech to his fellow leaders during the two-hour event, but it was not open to the media.
Analysts said Trump likely decided to appear at APEC this year to run for president while pursuing legal challenges against election winner Joe Biden.
His appearance was all the more surprising as the United States broke with tradition by failing to send a representative to deliver a public speech at the forum before the official summit on Friday.
Trump’s withdrawal from multilateral groupings like APEC has left the floor open for China to write the Asia-Pacific trade rules, and Xi used his speech at Friday’s summit to launch a strident defense of free trade.
“It is important that Asia-Pacific remains the benchmark for safeguarding peace and stability, upholding multilateralism and fostering an open world economy,” he said, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
“Free and open trade and investment cannot be achieved overnight.”
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However, his comments will attract attention in capitals where Beijing has been accused of blocking trade amid diplomatic disputes and using its huge economy as a bargaining chip to attack weaker rivals.
Xi also said that China would also consider joining the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, a giant regional free trade pact that was once championed by the United States under Barack Obama but later abandoned by Trump.
This year’s APEC meeting came a week after China and 14 other Asia-Pacific countries signed another free trade pact, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which will be the world’s largest.
READ: America lags behind after Asia forms the world’s largest trading bloc RCEP: US Chamber.
Comment: RCEP, a great victory in difficult times
The deal, which excludes the United States, has been seen as a major blow to China and further proof that Beijing is setting the agenda for global trade as Washington withdraws.
Signatories hope that RCEP will help their virus-affected economies on the road to recovery, and many leaders at the APEC forum cautioned against turning inward in response to the pandemic.
“We need to negotiate and invest to get out of the current economic recession,” Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said in his opening remarks at Friday’s summit.
“We must unite and work constructively so that the region moves forward on a path of solid, inclusive and sustainable economic growth and recovery.”
At the end of the summit, the leaders issued a joint statement pledging their determination to work together to recover from the pandemic.
Even agreeing to a statement was progress compared to the leaders’ previous summit in 2018, when they were unable to draft a joint statement due to escalating tensions between the United States and China over trade.
