China defends Asia-Pacific trade after Trump threat

24/11/2016 05:44 AST

China’s President Xi Jinping vowed to strengthen world trade in the face of US President-elect Donald Trump’s threat to pull out of a key trans-Pacific accord.

Speaking on a visit to Chile on Tuesday, he vowed to “push to build an Asia-Pacific free-trade zone and an open world economy.”

Trump on Monday vowed to withdraw the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact on his first day in the White House.

On the last stop of a tour to strengthen trade ties in Latin America, Xi said he and Chile’s President Michelle Bachelet agreed to join in a “full strategic relationship.” They expanded their countries’ existing free trade agreement and signed 12 cooperation agreements.

“To drive the long-term development of bilateral ties, we have decided to enhance our bilateral relations to a strategic relationship and open a new page in ties between Chine and Chile,” Xi told a news conference.

Chile is the world’s biggest copper producer and the second-largest producer of salmon. China is its biggest trade partner, receiving a quarter of all Chilean exports last year.

Xi also signed 18 new agreements with Peru on Monday. China will “play its role” in promoting economic integration in the Asia-Pacific, the foreign ministry said on Wednesday, after US President-elect Donald trump said he would kill an ambitious regional trade pact.

Trump’s statement appeared to open the way for China to assume the United States’ leadership mantle on trade and diplomacy in Asia. The Republican termed the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) “a potential disaster for our country”.

China, Japan and South Korea are already in the initial stages of discussing a trilateral trade deal, and Beijing has been pushing its own limited Asian regional trade pact that excludes Washington for the past five years.

Asked whether China would be a beneficiary of the US withdrawal from TPP, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said China had an open attitude towards any arrangement that promoted regional free trade.

The Gulf Today