As I see it | China’s place in a post-Trump world order is about relationships and good timing

Four years ago, in a sign of things to come, Beijing’s relations with the incoming US administration started on the wrong foot

This time round, Beijing is looking at ties with its Asian neighbours before managing China’s relationship with a Biden administration

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China looks to be mending fences close to home – including with Japan with which it is contesting the pictured Daiyou/Senkaku islands – amid expectations that US president-elect Joe Biden will try to rebuild old American relationships. Photo: Kyodo

Published: 2:02pm, 24 Nov 2020Updated: 11:04pm, 24 Nov 2020

Effective diplomacy is almost always about timing. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s visit to Japan and South Korea this week comes at a particularly sensitive moment. Beijing’s relations with its East Asian neighbours have been tested further in recent months in the midst of spiralling US-China rivalry (and thanks in no small part, to the coronavirus pandemic).

It is the first overseas trip by a top Chinese diplomat during US President Donald Trump’s lame-duck period before the inauguration of his Democratic successor Joe Biden in January. It will be revealing about how it conducts diplomacy in a post-Trump world and, arguably more importantly, how Beijing prioritises its long game of all-round confrontation with Washington in a new era.

Wang is tasked with mending fences with Tokyo amid concerns about renewed tensions over the Senkaku Islands, known as Diaoyu in China, and Japan’s active participation in the Quad, a US-led quadrilateral military alliance also consisting of Australia and India, which Wang dubbed an “Indo-Pacific Nato”.

He is also expected to push for President Xi Jinping’s visit to South Korea this year, despite the resurgence of coronavirus infections in Seoul and a recent diplomatic spat over the interpretation of the origins of the Korean war involving Xi himself.

China’s ambassador to Seoul, Xing Haiming, said last week Seoul would be the destination for Xi’s first overseas trip once the coronavirus situation stabilised.

Pundits say Wang’s trip is part of Beijing’s bid to pull the two US allies closer to China, while exploiting the power vacuum left by the chaotic presidential transition in Washington.

.css-1m2rp1p{color:#34b8b5;}As I see it | China’s place in a post-Trump world order is about relationships and good timing

As I see it | China’s place in a post-Trump world order is about relationships and good timing