1. After Trump went awol, this was Xi\u2019s moment<\/p>\n
Having dominated the headlines<\/a> for several days during visits to Malaysia<\/a>, Japan and South Korea, Donald Trump flew back to Washington on the eve of the Apec summit<\/a> in Gyeongju, leaving his treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, to do his bidding. Whether by accident or design, Trump\u2019s absence allowed Xi to fill the void and position himself as a unifying voice and champion of the region\u2019s economic interests, and an alternative to \u201cAmerica first\u201d protectionism. While Trump \u2013 who was showered with extravagant gifts by his Japanese and South Korean counterparts \u2013 dished out Halloween sweets at the White House, Xi embarked on a series of high-level bilateral meetings.<\/p>\n No one was pretending that the two-day summit would eclipse Xi and Trump\u2019s tariff truce<\/a> earlier in the week, but the US president\u2019s no-show at least allowed other leaders to amplify their messages \u2013 the Canadian prime minister Mark Carney\u2019s dramatic pronouncement<\/a> of the end of rules-based free trade; and Xi\u2019s call to arms as a torchbearer for free and open trade, a responsibility that once fell to Trump\u2019s predecessors. Trump may have been presented with a gold crown<\/a> by the Apec hosts, but in Gyeongju, a historic city dotted with Silla dynasty tombs, Xi was king.<\/p>\n 2. Apec-style summitry is on life support<\/p>\n It says something about the fractured nature of Apec that, as regional leaders prepared to leave South Korea on Saturday, there was speculation they would struggle to agree on a communique amid differences over trade. In the end, a vague declaration did appear, committing member states to \u201cacknowledge the importance of a trade environment that promotes resilience and benefits for all\u201d. It did not, though, mention multilateralism or the World Trade Organization, which sets the rules for global trade.<\/p>\n The 21-member Apec is a loose coalition of countries united by little more than geography and divided along deep political and economic fault lines, from the liberal democracies of Japan and South Korea to autocratic regimes in China, Russia and Vietnam. In that sense, it is a minor miracle that a body that disparate manages to hold annual meetings. But the lack of consensus in Gyeongju is a symptom of a wider trend that has accelerated since Trump \u2013 who has never hidden his disdain for multiparty gatherings \u2013 returned to the White House.<\/p>\n As the summit neared its end, South Korean officials were working hard to prod member states to adopt a joint declaration and avoid a repeat of the 2018 summit in Papua New Guinea, where leaders failed to produce a communique due to trade friction between the US and China. The last two days have added to the sense that Apec\u2019s mission is no longer suited to the economic zeitgeist. Its foundation in 1989 came at a time of increasing globalisation and regional economic integration. The world is dramatically different today \u2013 a fact that not even Apec\u2019s able and gracious hosts, South Korea, could mask.<\/p>\n 3. Canada and China are finally building bridges<\/p>\n If d\u00e9tente was achieved at Apec, it was between Canada and China. Carney left his meeting with Xi with an invitation to visit China, no doubt relieved that under his seven-month-old administration, bilateral ties were, in Xi\u2019s words, \u201cshowing signs of recovery\u201d. Again, there was no escaping the Trump factor. Just days after the White House abruptly cancelled trade negotiations and slapped additional tariffs on Canada in protest at an Ontario government-sponsored TV advert critical of Trump\u2019s predilection for tariffs<\/a>, Carney and Xi found themselves occupying common ground.<\/p>\n The bar for reconciliation was, admittedly, very low after years of discord<\/a> under Carney\u2019s predecessor, Justin Trudeau. Nonetheless, both men were positive about the meeting\u2019s outcome. A Canadian statement described it as a \u201cturning point\u201d in bilateral ties, which can only improve as the Trump-Carney row intensifies. As Carney announced plans to double non-US exports over the next decade, Trump ruled out a resumption of trade negotiations with Canada, a sign, according to Daniel B\u00e9land, a professor at McGill University in Montreal, that the Trump administration \u201cis very likely to resent this rapprochement between Canada and China\u201d.<\/p>\n 4. Sanae Takaichi gets through her whirlwind diplomatic debut<\/p>\n As the only woman among the 14 leaders who attended the summit (Trump and six others sent representatives), Japan\u2019s newly installed prime minister, Sanae Takaichi<\/a>, came under immediate pressure to demonstrate her diplomatic skills, beginning with a visit to Tokyo<\/a> by the US president, followed by potentially awkward meetings in Gyeongju with Xi and the South Korean president, Lee Jae Myung.<\/p>\n Japan\u2019s first female leader, who was approved by parliament less than a fortnight ago, did not make waves, but gave early indications that foreign policy might not turn out to be her achilles heel, as some observers had predicted during her rise to the top of Japan\u2019s male-dominated political world. Much of that was about sticking to a script that was long on platitudes. She and Lee agreed to promote \u201cfuture-oriented\u201d ties \u2013 which is just as well.<\/p>\n While Trump did not get his fourth meeting with Kim Jong-un<\/a>, the Gyeongju summit was a reminder of overlapping Japanese and South Korean interests when it comes to North Korea, which on Saturday described abandoning its nuclear weapons as a \u201cpipe dream\u201d. And after a slightly awkward handshake with Xi on Friday, she spoke of a \u201cstrategic and mutually beneficial relationship\u201d, while raising concerns over China\u2019s human rights record and its military activities in the South China Sea. Takaichi\u2019s low-key international debut over the past week suggested that a foreign policy pragmatist lurks behind the arch-conservative<\/a> image. Her hop back across the Japan Sea (or the East Sea if you are Korean) later today will not be a forlorn one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"1. 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