China Opens New Beginning with US Allies as Trade War Heats Up

JAKARTA – China opening a new chapter with allies of the United States (US) amidst the heat trade war Beijing and Washington. It is marked when Prime Minister of China Li Qiang met with top officials from both countries, namely Japan and South Korea (South Korea) for the first three-way talks in four years at the beginning of last week.

Li Qiang hailed what he called a restart of ties and efforts to revive trade and security dialogue hampered by global tensions.

The Chinese prime minister met with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in Seoul with efforts to revitalize negotiations on a three-way free trade agreement, which has been at the top of the agenda after stalling since 2019.

Opening the summit, Li said the talks were a “restart and a new beginning” and called for the resumption of comprehensive cooperation between East Asia’s economic powers. However, he provided an additional note, that for all of this to happen, politics must be separated from economic and trade issues.

He also called for an end to protectionism and the decoupling of supply chains. “For China, South Korea and Japan, our close relations will not change, the spirit of cooperation achieved through crisis response will not change and our mission to maintain regional peace and stability will not change,” Li said.

Despite the agreements signed during the talks, the meeting itself is seen as a sign of progress in relations between the three countries that have been full of ups and downs.

China and South Korea as well as Japan (which is allied with the US) are trying to manage mutual distrust amidst competition between Beijing and Washington. US and Chinese relations are strained over democratically ruled Taiwan, which China claims as its own, and North Korea’s nuclear program.

Yoon and Kishida have charted a course closer to each other and to Washington, beginning unprecedented three-way cooperation with the United States on military and other measures.

Meanwhile US President Joe Biden has stepped up barriers to Chinese imports, raising tariffs on a range of Chinese imports including electric vehicle (EV) batteries and computer chips. Donald Trump, his rival in the upcoming presidential election in November, has imposed tariffs of 60% or higher on all Chinese products.

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