Trade, China, scandal: what’s the agenda as Malaysia, Singapore leaders meet Trump?

Najib Razak, Lee Hsien Loong and Thailand’s Prayuth Chan-ocha are heading to the White House with a common goal

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Clockwise from top left: Malaysia’s Najib Razak, America’s Donald Trump, Singapore’s Lee Hsien Loong, Thailand’s Prayuth Chan-ocha. File photos

Published: 8:00am, 10 Sep 2017Updated: 2:01pm, 10 Sep 2017

The leaders of Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand have a uphill task in their upcoming White House visits if they are to redirect the gaze of a famously ‘America First’ president towards Southeast Asia.

With extreme weather, gridlock on Capitol Hill and a high stakes game of nuclear chicken with North Korea preoccupying President Donald Trump, the prime ministers of the three countries must pull out all the stops to achieve a unified objective: Convince the leader of the world’s largest economy to scale back his protectionist agenda, and keep the region firmly in his sights.

Malaysia’s Najib Razak, on a whistle-stop US tour, will take the first go when he meets Trump in the Oval Office on Tuesday.

Singapore’s Lee Hsien Loong and Thailand’s Prayuth Chan-ocha are due in Washington in October.

The meetings follow Vietnam premier Nguyen Xuan Phuc’s White House visit in May – the first by a Southeast Asian leader under the new US administration.

Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc meets US President Donald Trump at the White House. Photo: AFP

Foreign policy observers say the visits signify an emphatic push by the region to advance trade relations that blossomed during the administration of Barack Obama but are now under threat due to Trump’s antipathy over global free trade.

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