Trump expected to stick to regional security tenets: Kerry reassures Vietnam

HANOI — United States Secretary of State John Kerry began his farewell tour in Vietnam yesterday, giving a final push for Washington’s so-called Asia pivot before President-elect Donald Trump takes office next week.

Vietnam has been at the centre of outgoing President Barack Obama’s Asia embrace, marked by the lifting of a wartime-era arms embargo, major growth in trade and the signing of the massive Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact.

Mr Trump, whose tirades against the costs of globalisation to American workers helped propel him to office, has vowed to scrap the TPP on his first day in office.

But analysts say ties are unlikely to crumble, despite uncertainty over the incoming leader’s Asia strategy.

Mr Kerry’s visit to Vietnam, his fourth trip to the communist country as America’s top diplomat, is political and deeply personal.

The former naval officer won a Silver Star for his service during the Vietnam War after beaching his patrol boat and storming ashore to shoot dead a Viet Cong ambusher in Ca Mau province in 1969. Mr Kerry later came to see the war as a mistake and after his return from combat campaigned for peace.

“I’m delighted to be back in Vietnam, where we are developing still a growing relationship,” said Mr Kerry during yesterday’s meeting with Acting Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son and Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc.

“There have been a lot of steps forward but there are still some challenges, as you know,” he said, after a reporter asked him about Vietnam’s patchy human rights record. The communist country routinely jails dissidents and government critics.

Mr Kerry later told a university audience in Hanoi that he was confident the incoming Trump administration would stick to the same principles on regional security as those of the Obama administration.

Referring to the disputed South China Sea, he said countries big or small should refrain from provocation and any dispute should be solved peacefully in accordance with international law.

After official meetings in Hanoi, Mr Kerry travelled to Ho Chi Minh City. Today, he heads to the Bay Hap River in Ca Mau to revisit the site of his 1969 ambush.

The relationship between the two countries has transformed since the painful and bloody war era. The US is Vietnam’s top export market and trade between the pair has tripled in recent years, along with a major boost in US investments in the manufacturing hub.

Mr Obama’s administration has made Asia — home to some of the world’s fastest growing economies — a priority, as a counterbalance to Chinese power.

“Kerry’s visit underscores the importance of Vietnam in the US-Asia policy,” Netherlands-based Vietnam analyst Jonathan London told AFP.

Mr Trump’s tough talk on rebalancing global trade and vow to scrap the TPP has clouded the future of that policy. “But it would be premature to assume that he will totally scrap the interests of US firms that operate in East Asia (despite Mr Trump’s rhetoric),” added Mr London.

Vietnam is seeking diplomatic ballast in the South China Sea in the face of increasingly aggressive actions by China in the strategically crucial waterway.

Washington has remained neutral in overlapping disputes with Beijing in the South China Sea, insisting that freedom of navigation must be respected in the oil-rich shipping route.

But Mr Trump’s nominee to replace Mr Kerry, former oilman Rex Tillerson, this week warned of a “clear signal” to China to stop building on disputed islands after the new president takes office on Jan 20.

Mr Kerry will head to Paris for a Middle East peace conference tomorrow, followed by a stop in London before heading to Davos for the World Economic Forum next week. AFP