SEOUL, South Korea – Expectations ahead of a high-profile China, Japan and South Korea joint summit had been modest, and Monday’s outcome confirmed the accuracy of the predictions.
The ninth trilateral between the three East Asian powers in a series initiated in 2008, hosted by Seoul, was the first such gathering since 2019, marking the format’s resumption following the global COVID-19 pandemic.
While Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol attended, Chinese President Xi Jinping was absent, with Beijing represented by Premier Li Qiang. The three leaders held trilateral talks Monday after separate bilateral discussions on Sunday. They beamed for cameras but spoke frankly.
“I hope to continue to strengthen bilateral cooperation even in the face of today’s global complex crises,” Mr. Yoon said, while Mr. Kishida told Mr. Li of his “serious concerns” about China’s military moves in the region, especially regarding Taiwan.
For his part, Mr. Li said he hoped to “build consensus and resolve differences” through “equal dialogue and sincere communications,” but although the three countries agreed to meet again next year in Japan, analysts said hopes for more ambitious breakthroughs had not materialized.
In a joint press conference, Mr. Kishida and Mr. Yoon resumed calls for the removal of all nuclear arms from the divided Korean peninsula — just as news was breaking that North Korea was announcing plans for the launch of what is believed to be its second military satellite by June 4.
North Korea on Monday launched a rocket likely carrying its second military spy satellite on Monday night, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The two leaders denounced Pyongyang’s plans as a clear violation of U.N. sanctions, but Mr. Li did not mention the nuclear issue and urged all parties to exercise restraint.
Given the geopolitical chasm dividing Communist-ruled China from democratic U.S. allies Japan and South Korea, any political breakthrough was going to be tough. But deliverables on trade were equally underwhelming.
The three economies are competitive rather than complementary across a range of sectors, including, autos, electronic devices and shipbuilding. Hopes of a free-trade zone uniting the three powerhouses remain far distant. The three also conceded that an existing free trade agreement requires accelerated implementation.
The joint statement issued by the summit leader made clear that any commitments were nonbinding. The three agreed to “strive” to institutionalize the trilateral framework, to “make efforts” for the people of each country to benefit, to “identify” mutual cooperation projects and to “promote” trilateral initiatives with other countries.
Perhaps not coincidentally, the U.S. State Department announced Monday that Deputy Secretary Kurt Cambell would host his Japanese and South Korean counterparts for a mini-summit Friday in Virginia, saying the meeting was planned to build on a high-profile Camp David summit U.S. President Biden held with Mr. Kishida and Mr. Yoon last year. The talks will “reaffirm the importance of trilateral cooperation in advancing a free and open, connected, prosperous, secure, and resilient Indo-Pacific region,” the State Department said in its statement.
Regional insecurity
Across East Asia, the risk is rising.
A defiant and nuclear-armed North Korea is upping capabilities and has deepened ties with Russia. China is embroiled in territorial disputes with Japan and the Philippines, while tensions are peaking with Taiwan.
While the summit heads in Seoul Monday “reaffirmed that maintaining peace, stability and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia serves our common interest and is our common responsibility,” there was no indication how peace would be maintained, nor agreement on other matters.
They “reiterated positions on regional peace and stability, denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the abductions issue, respectively,” the statement noted. The latter refers to Japanese and South Korean civilians kidnapped by North Korea.
But in the U.N. Security Council, South Korea and Japan are at odds with China over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and over China’s reluctance to rein in North Korea’s missile tests, despite Beijing’s economic leverage with Pyongyang.
Trade outcomes also left observers unimpressed: The three committed to upgrading the World Trade Organization’s function and agreed to “keep up discussions for speeding up negotiations for a Trilateral Free Trade Area.”
The three countries have held 16 rounds of FTA negotiations since 2012, with no deal in sight.
Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo are united under an unwieldy 2020 free trade agreement, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, which links developed and developing economies with mild commitments and distant implementation timelines. The three agreed on “the importance of ensuring implementation” of RCEP, and on adding new members.
“RCEP is a good way for countries who aren’t yet ready to make high-standard commitments to see how a lower standard agreement works and benefits them,” said Tami Overby, who headed the AMCHAM Korea during South Korea-U.S. free trade negotiations.
Ms. Overby, now a counselor at D.C.-based Denton Global Advisors, added, “Even though China, Japan and Korea are members of RCEP, all three countries see value in trying to improve their relationships.”
A Japanese official who briefed foreign journalists said RCEP was “not a high-standard [free-trade agreement],” pointing to Beijing’s state subsidies and excess industrial capacity. “Unless China is on board, we cannot come up with a legally binding mechanism,” he said.
In Seoul, Japan urged China to lift its ban on Japanese seafood imports, initiated after Tokyo began, last year, releasing water from the coolant tanks of the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant, but China did not agree.
There were some pluses.
In a region where historical animosities — which often play out online in furious disputes among nationalistic netizens — generate cross-border enmity, the three agreed to upgrade people-to-people ties and the expansion of a joint education project, CAMPUS Asia. As well as reaffirming commitments to global climate-change initiatives, the three agreed to collaborate with Mongolia on reducing sandstorms.
The China-Mongolia Gobi Desert is a source of yellow dust, which, when blown by easterlies, collects pollutants across China’s industrial belt, and then degrades air quality across China, Korea and Japan. The three countries – all facing population declines – agreed to “share expertise” on that problem. None, however, has produced plans to resolve the issue.
The Japanese official said tough issues “could not be resolved overnight,” and that the summit was “about cooperation, not confrontation.”
Others suggested real trilateralism is doomed.
Speaking to the media before the summit, Lee Hee-ok, a Chinese specialist at Seoul’s Sunkyunkwan University, warned, “I believe there will be many obstacles for the three countries to come to an agreement.”
“Since the previous summit, a lot of changes have occurred,” Mr. Lee said, citing intensified China-U.S competition and tightened U.S.-South Korea-Japan security cooperation.
“All sides were able to present themselves as key regional players, able to cooperate,” added Joel Atkinson, who watches regional politics from Seoul’s Hankuk University of Foreign Studies.
But he called the results “low-key.”
“Ultimately, cooperation is limited by the future Asia each wants to see: Beijing sees itself at the center, with the U.S. stepping out, it’s getting more ambitious and impatient,” Mr. Atkinson said. “Seoul and Tokyo want China to go back to how it was 20 years ago, but that is not going to happen.”
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.