Are South China Sea and tensions with US still too hot to handle at Beijing security forum?
- Panellists at Xiangshan Forum largely steer clear of sensitive subjects even though organisers hope it will become a leading international conference
An annual conference that Beijing hopes will become Asia’s leading forum for discussing security issues had its largest-ever attendance this year – but organisers’ reluctance to let delegates discuss some of the key issues affecting the region highlighted the distance it needs to travel to surpass a similar gathering in Singapore.
Key issues such as the growing Sino-US rivalry were scarcely touched on at the main sessions of the two-day Xiangshan Forum, which ended on Friday.
Meanwhile discussion of the long-running territorial dispute in the South China Sea was confined to a plenary session that covered the broader topic of maritime security cooperation.
By contrast both issues are regularly discussed at the IISS Asia Security Summit in Singapore, known as the Shangri-La Dialogue, which Beijing hopes Xiangshan will supplant.
Only one of the military delegates invited to speak at the Xiangshan event – a representative from the Philippines – came from a country embroiled in the South China Sea disputes.
Many other foreign delegates included representatives of countries such as Sri Lanka, Ecuador, Pakistan – which have all expressed support for China’s “Belt and Road Initiative”.