APEC Summit may be crucial moment for North-east Asia’s ‘Big 3’

Successful diplomatic summits are almost always pre-cooked affairs, with every aspect of the meeting, from the initial handshakes to the final communique, minutely choreographed. But this month’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Beijing looks like a high-risk enterprise. It is not even clear whether Chinese President Xi Jinping will agree to meet one of his most important guests, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. It is also unclear whether Mr Abe will be able to meet South Korean President Park Geun-hye.

And yet, there is considerable reason to hope for not only formal handshakes and bilateral meetings among North-east Asia’s “Big Three” leaders, but also substantive discussions aimed at lowering tensions in the region. This hope is built on all three leaders’ need for a period of diplomatic quiet, owing to the difficult domestic challenges that each now faces.

Mr Xi may be confronting the most difficult domestic agenda: An effort to engineer a relatively smooth transition from an economic structure based on manufacturing and exports to one in which domestic consumption and services fuel growth. Its structural transformation has not only caused the economy to slow, but also exposed deep flaws in China’s financial system.

The shift in the country’s economic model would be difficult under the best of circumstances. But it is being undertaken simultaneously with the deepest political purge China has experienced since the days of Mao Zedong, with Mr Xi targeting corrupt officials high and low. At the moment, the focus seems to be on People’s Liberation Army officers and those tied to imprisoned former Chongqing Communist Party boss Bo Xilai and former Politburo security chief Zhou Yongkang, who is awaiting sentencing. Indeed, the most perilous phase of the purge may now be under way, given the recent arrest of the Sichuan Military District’s deputy commander— a key post given the district’s large and restive Tibetan population.

Mr Abe’s domestic troubles, stemming from two decades of economic stagnation, are well known. Though his economic strategy, known as Abenomics, appears to have ended deflation, vibrant growth is nowhere in sight. Moreover, after a series of scandals had cost Mr Abe some newly-appointed ministers, some fear that he may no longer be willing to follow through on the liberalising structural reforms — the so-called third arrow of Abenomics — that sustained economic recovery requires.

Ms Park may appear to face the least vexing domestic conditions, with South Korea’s economy growing at a 3.2 per cent annual pace in the second quarter of this year, only marginally lower than market forecasts. But the President undoubtedly views her domestic circumstances as anything but rosy; in many ways, this has been an annus horribilis for her and her country.

Indeed, disaster has stalked South Korea this year, beginning in April with the sinking of the Sewol ferry, which claimed about 300 lives, with most of them high school students. The trial of the Sewol’s captain, the apparent suicide of the owner of the operator of the ferry and a series of scandals involving beatings and bullying leading to death and suicide among army conscripts have cost Ms Park key ministerial resignations and created a pervasive sense of unease about how the country is governed.

Complicating matters further is the need for Ms Park to devise a viable response to a new diplomatic charm offensive by North Korea’s usually charmless leader, Mr Kim Jong-un. Ms Park remains, rightly, a sceptic concerning Mr Kim’s motives, but the spectacle of the North’s second-highest-ranking official appearing suddenly at the Asian Games earlier last month created a frisson of excitement that, perhaps, Kim the Younger may actually want to improve relations.

APEC SUMMIT A MAKE-OR-BREAK MOMENT FOR TRIO?

Faced with these domestic concerns, all three leaders need a respite from the tensions that have bedevilled relations among their countries over the past three years. But because each has played on these tensions — particularly with Japan — in order to control their domestic opponents, achieving this respite may prove difficult.

And yet, there are signs that the three leaders understand that the APEC summit may be a make-or-break moment for relations between their countries. Much of the worst anti-Japanese bombast has disappeared from Chinese television in recent weeks, and former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda met Mr Xi in Beijing last week. This does not yet add up to a thaw in the bilateral relationship but it does suggest that Mr Xi may be seeking a respite — at least until China’s economy is on a more stable footing and his anti-corruption campaign begins to wind down.

Ms Park, too, has sent signals that she may want to ease tensions. She recently met former Japanese Finance Minister Fukushiro Nukaga, and the chief of South Korea’s National Security Office, Mr Kim Kwan-jin, recently met Mr Abe’s National Security Adviser Shotaro Yachi.

With Mr Abe, Ms Park and Mr Xi each facing daunting domestic challenges, a rare convergence in each country of self-interest and national interest may be creating a chance for improved relations. The question is whether North-east Asia’s Big Three leaders can overcome old positions, shake hands and get serious about regional diplomacy. PROJECT SYNDICATE

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Yuriko Koike, Japan’s former Defence Minister, National Security Adviser and chairperson of the Liberal Democratic Party General Council, is a member of the National Diet.