WASHINGTON (AP) – Threats from China and North Korea will loom over the Biden administration’s first cabinet trip abroad, as part of a greater effort to strengthen US influence and allay concerns about America’s role in Asia.
A senior government official said on Saturday that US officials had tried to reach North Korea through several channels last month, but had not yet received a response. This makes consultations with the detainee’s neighbors, Japan, South Korea and China, all the more critical.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin are heading to Japan and South Korea for four days of talks starting Monday, as the new administration seeks to strengthen partnerships with the two key regional allies. Blinken and Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan will meet with Chinese officials in Anchorage, Alaska on Thursday.
The trip is meant to restore what Biden hopes will be a reassuring and uniform approach to ties with Tokyo and Seoul after four years of transactional and often temperamental relations under Donald Trump. He raised diplomatic standards by meeting not once but three times with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Blinken and Austin also plan virtual meetings with journalists, members of civil society and others. After securing counterparts in US commitments to Japanese and South Korean security, they intend to focus on an increasingly assertive China, the North Korean nuclear challenge and the coronavirus pandemic.
In his first months in office, Biden signaled his desire to bring Asia-Pacific back to the forefront of the US foreign policy agenda. In line with its broader diplomatic theme “America is back”, Biden is committed to keeping stability in the region at the heart of its international initiatives.
On Friday, Biden attended a virtual summit with leaders from India, Japan and Australia. “A free and open Indo-Pacific is essential,” Biden said. “The United States is committed to working with you, our partners and all our allies in the region to achieve stability.”
As part of that effort and “to reduce the risk of escalation,” the senior official said efforts have been made to connect with North Koreans since mid-February, including through what is known as ” the New York Canal ”. So far, the official said that “we have not received any response from Pyongyang.” The official was not allowed to discuss diplomatic actions publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Meanwhile, US and South Korean negotiators overcame years of controversial talks under Trump to reach an interim agreement on paying for US troops in South Korea. The agreement, along with a similar one for Japan, will be at the heart of the Blinken and Austin meetings.
As he had done with allies in Europe, Trump threatened to cut security co-operation unless host countries paid more. This has led to fears of withdrawing troops at a time of great uncertainty, as China is stepping up efforts to dominate the region and North Korea’s nuclear weapons remain a major source of anxiety.
“Diplomacy is once again at the heart of our foreign policy, and we are working to strengthen America’s relations with our allies, as well as their relations,” said Sung Kim, who is the top American diplomat for Asia. He served in the Philippines and Indonesia during the Trump administration and was previously the special envoy for North Korea.
For all of Biden’s suggestions that he would reverse Trump’s apparent hostility toward China, Biden has not yet contradicted any of his predecessor’s policies. In fact, he reaffirmed several of them, including maintaining sanctions in response to human rights violations in western Xinjiang and Hong Kong and reaffirming a Trump-era decision to completely reject almost all of China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea.
Many of China’s policies that the United States considers unacceptable – including its repression in Hong Kong, intensified rhetoric against Taiwan and actions in the South China Sea – began during the Obama administration. The previous Democratic administration took office by promising a “pivot in Asia,” after a period of what many saw as the American neglect of the region during George W. Bush’s presidency, which was consumed by the outbreak of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In fact, although some obvious circumstances have changed since 2009, Blinken and Austin’s trip reflects in many ways the initial trip abroad of President Barack Obama’s first secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, when she traveled to Japan, South Korea. Indonesia and then China in an attempt to reaffirm US interests in Asia-Pacific. Obama’s engagement with China, however, did not produce the desired results, and the North Korean threat increased.
Although China is not on Blinken’s itinerary after completing his stop in Seoul, he will fly back to Washington via Anchorage, Alaska, where he and Sullivan will meet with senior Chinese officials. Austin will travel from Seoul to New Delhi for meetings with Indian leaders.
However, the administration is convinced that its internal efforts to revitalize the US, the economy and intensify the fight against COVID-19 have put it in a better position both to directly dampen Chinese ambitions and to -capitalize on partnerships to do the same.
“After the last 50 days, Secretary Blinken and I will meet with senior Chinese officials from a position of strength,” Sulllivan said on Friday.