U.S.-China Trade Talks To Resume — But at What Cost?

On the sidelines of the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to restart trade negotiations that had broken down in May. Trump promised not to proceed with tariff increases on China and indicated some flexibility on whether U.S. sales of technology or equipment to the Chinese telecom giant Huawei would be permitted.

The meeting has de-escalated bilateral tensions — but Asia Society Policy Institute experts Kevin Rudd and Wendy Cutler said that several key questions remain.

“From the Chinese perspective — they’re pretty happy with the outcome,” Rudd said in an appearance on CNBC’s Squawk Box. “What they expected was a reboot of the negotiations. Tick, that was done. What they didn’t expect were the two other gifts that the president delivered. One was the announcement that there’d be no new tariffs until the negotiations — something that had been a big factor in domestic Chinese markets. And what really got them by surprise was the statement on Huawei.”

Rudd and Cutler further discussed the Trump-Xi meeting at the G20 in the latest episode of ASPI’s Asia Inside Out podcast. Cutler noted that the resumption of talks “doesn’t mean that the negotiators’ job will be easy. There’s no further guidance given to them, so they’ll find themselves with the same set of issues. This is complicated by the fact that both China and the United States have been public about what their priorities are and what their red lines are.”

Listen to Podcast

NORTH KOREA

A Surprise Rendezvous With Kim Jong Un

It was, no doubt, historic: On Sunday, Trump became the first sitting U.S. president to set foot in North Korea when he crossed the demilitarized zone during a surprise hourlong meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Sunday’s meeting was the first since negotiations over North Korea’s nuclear weapons program held in Hanoi ended in failure in February. The chummy gathering prompted Ronna McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee, to claim that “we’re now as close to peace as ever.”

The rendezvous at the DMZ “re-starts a process that had gotten stuck,” said ASPI Vice President Daniel Russel on the latest episode of the Asia Inside Out podcast. But Russel added that Trump’s willingness to meet with Kim without preconditions represents a shift in the overall American strategy toward North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

“[The United States] is not negotiating a rollback or dismantling, but instead bargaining over a freeze on additional production of nuclear weapons,” he said. “This is something that not only the Bush or Obama administrations but also the Trump administration in its first year and a half had repeatedly ruled out.”

“It means de facto accepting that they’re a nuclear weapons state.”

In an appearance on MSNBC’s Live with Ali Velshi, ASPI’s Lindsey Ford expressed similar reservations about the wisdom of President Trump’s whirlwind trip to Panmunjom. “I don’t think the president was interested in diplomacy,” she said. “I think he was after clickbait.”

Watch

CURRENT AFFAIRS

Hong Kong Protests Intensify

Monday was a public holiday in Hong Kong, marking the 22nd anniversary of the territory’s handover from British to Chinese rule. It also marked an escalation of the most serious demonstrations in Hong Kong since 1997, as protesters broke into the Legislative Council and briefly occupied the building.

Monday’s provocation was designed to apply pressure on Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam, who has resisted calls to resign over her handling of a proposed extradition law that, critics claim, would make Hong Kong residents vulnerable to becoming enmeshed in mainland China’s legal system. Lam’s apology and suspension of the law have so far failed to mollify the protesters — but The New York Times reported that Monday’s vandalism of the LegCo has led some Hong Kong residents to call the movement’s tactics into question.

Nevertheless, the protests have put the Hong Kong government and police forces in a difficult position. “If they push too hard, they might spark further protests,” Isaac Stone Fish, senior fellow for the Center on U.S.-China Relations at Asia Society said on CNN. “But if they don’t push hard enough, it might give people in mainland China the idea that they may be able to protest as well.”

In May, Asia Society New York hosted a panel discussion on the future of China-Hong Kong relations. Watch the whole thing here.

Watch

ET CETERA

Violence in Afghanistan, Nuclear Weapons in Iran

Here’s what else is happening:

A Taliban attack aimed at a government facility killed 40 people in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Monday. Afghanistan National Security Adviser Hamdullah Mohib discussed his country’s security challenges at Asia Society New York in March — watch here.
International inspectors confirmed that Iran had exceeded a critical limit on the amount of nuclear fuel it can possess under the terms of the Iran Nuclear Deal, from which the United States withdrew last year. To get a sense of Tehran’s perspective on its nuclear program, watch Asia Society President and CEO Josette Sheeran’s interview with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif from this April.

UPCOMING EVENTS

On July 4, Asia Society Policy Salon Tokyo hosts Yoseph Ayele, co-founder and CEO of the Edmund Hillary Fellowship, for a discussion of the Global Impact Visa. Details here.
Also on the 4th, Asia Society Hong Kong presents a documentary screening of China Love, a new film that shows contemporary China through the lens of the pre-wedding photography industry. Olivia Martin-McGuire, the film’s director, will appear alongside David Shaw and Jenny Cheng, two of the film’s subjects. More here.
On July 5, Asia Society Hong Kong will host a talk on India-China relations by Vikram Misri, India’s ambassador to China.
And on July 11, Australia’s incoming ambassador to China, Graham Fletcher, will discuss the state of the bilateral relationship at Asia Society Australia in Melbourne.

JOIN & SUPPORT

Asia Society relies on the generosity of its friends and members to support its mission of strengthening relationships and promoting understanding among the people, leaders, and institutions of Asia and the United States.