“Not China, not Japan, not any other power. That is something which we continue and encourage at every opportunity,” he said.
The perennial disputes that hobble all trade agreements, such as market access and protection of intellectual property, are rearing anew in the TPP negotiations and Malaysia sees the end-of-year deadline as “very tight”.
China is not party to the TPP and is instead pushing ahead with a rival mega-trade pact grouping 16 countries in the region, potentially opening up a new front in the struggle between the world powers for strategic dominance of the Asia-Pacific.
“China is very important for the Southeast Asian economies, like it or not,” said Finance Minister Chatib Basri of Indonesia, which has stayed out of the TPP talks.
At the level of APEC, which spans the Pacific from East Asia and Australia to the United States and Mexico, the 21 members have settled for a more distant time-frame of 2020 for a non-binding series of trade goals that have failed to make much headway at successive summits.
Harmony will break out on Tuesday, however, when all the leaders – minus Obama – don national garb of the host country for APEC”s traditional “family photo”. Indonesia has reportedly eschewed its famous batik cloth for shirts and blouses made of a silk-like fabric called endek.
Soldiers and paramilitary police were out in force for the summit. This week marks the 11th anniversary of the Bali bombings, which killed 202 people, mostly Western holidaymakers.
