WASHINGTON (AP) – Threats from China and North Korea to seize during Biden administration’s first overseas trip, part of a larger effort to bolster U.S. influence and allay concerns on the role of the United States in Asia.
A senior government official said Saturday that U.S. officials have tried to reach North Korea through various channels since last month, but have yet to receive a response. This makes consultations with the country’s neighbors, Japan, South Korea and China, more important.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin will head to Japan and South Korea for four days of talks starting Monday, as the new administration tries to strengthen alliances with the two key regional allies. Blinken and Biden national security adviser Jake Sullivan to meet with Chinese officials in Anchorage, Alaska, on Thursday.
Cabinet members ’trip to Asia aims to restore what Biden hopes will be a calming and uniform approach to ties with Tokyo and Seoul after four years of transactional and often temperamental relations under Donald Trump. He had changed diplomatic rules by meeting not once, but three times, with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Blinken and Austin also plan virtual meetings with journalists, members of civil society, and others. After reassuring their counterparts of U.S. commitments to Japanese and South Korean security, they plan to focus on an increasingly demanding China, North Korea’s nuclear challenge, and the coronavirus pandemic.
In his first months in office, Biden has signaled his desire to return Asia-Pacific to the top of the U.S. foreign policy agenda. In line with its broader diplomatic theme, “America is back,” Biden is committed to keeping stability in the region at the center of its international initiatives.
On Friday, Biden participated in a virtual summit with leaders from India, Japan and Australia. “A free and open Indo-Pacific is essential,” Biden said. “The United States is committed to working with you, our partners and all our allies in the region to achieve stability.”
As part of that effort and “to reduce the risks of escalation,” the senior official said efforts had been made to connect with North Koreans since mid-February, even through what it is known as the “New York Canal.” So far, the official said, “we have not received any response from Pyongyang.” The official was not allowed to publicly discuss the diplomatic broadcast and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Meanwhile, US and South Korean negotiators have overcome years of controversial discussions under Trump to reach an interim agreement on paying for the presence of U.S. troops in South Korea. This agreement, along with another similar one for Japan, will be the focus of the Blinken and Austin meetings.
As he had done with allies in Europe, Trump threatened to reduce security cooperation unless host countries paid more. This sparked fears about the withdrawal of troops at a time of particular uncertainty, as China is pushing for efforts to dominate the region and North Korea’s nuclear weapons remain a major source of distress.
“Diplomacy is once again at the center of our foreign policy and we are working to strengthen America’s relations with our allies, as well as relations between them,” said Sung Kim, who is the top U.S. diplomat for in Asia. He served in the Philippines and Indonesia during the Trump administration and was previously also the special envoy for North Korea.
For all of Biden’s suggestions that he will reverse Trump’s manifest hostility toward China, Biden has yet to reject a single one of his predecessor’s policies. In fact, he has reaffirmed several of them, including sanctions in response to human rights abuses in western Xinjiang and Hong Kong and reiterating the Trump-era decision to completely reject all of China’s maritime claims at sea. of South China.
Many of China’s policies that the U.S. considers unacceptable, including its repression in Hong Kong, intensified rhetoric against Taiwan and actions in the South China Sea began during the Obama administration. The former Democratic administration took office promising a “pivot to Asia” after a period of what many saw as the American abandonment of the region during the presidency of George W. Bush, which was consumed by the outbreak of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In fact, while some obvious circumstances have changed since 2009, Blinken and Austin’s trip reflects in many ways the initial trip abroad of President Barack Obama’s first secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, when she traveled. in Japan, South Korea, Indonesia and then China in an attempt to reaffirm U.S. interests in the Asia-Pacific. Obama’s engagement with China, however, did not produce the desired results and the North Korean threat grew.
Although China is not on Blinken’s itinerary, after finishing the stop in Seoul, he will fly back to Washington for Anchorage, Alaska, where he and Sullivan will meet with senior Chinese officials. Austin will travel from Seoul to New Delhi to meet with Indian leaders.
However, the administration is convinced that its national efforts to revitalize the US economy and intensify the fight against COVID-19 have put it in a better position, both to directly tarnish Chinese ambitions and to take advantage of it. their associations to do the same.
“After the work of the past 50 days, Secretary Blinken and I will enter the meeting with senior Chinese representatives from a position of strength,” Sulllivan said Friday.