Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi seeks to bolster Beijing’s position in Southeast Asia on latest tour of region

The visit will start in Myanmar, which Wang will be the highest-ranking Chinese official to visit since last year’s coup

The tour is seen as Beijing’s latest response to counter Joe Biden’s Indo-Pacific Framework, which seeks to counter China’s influence in the region

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The tour will include a meeting of foreign ministers from along the Mekong. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:30pm, 2 Jul 2022Updated: 8:50pm, 2 Jul 2022

China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi will begin a tour of five Southeast Asian nations on Sunday in the latest bid to woo its neighbours and counter Washington’s diplomatic and economic outreach in the region.

Wang’s tour starts in Myanmar, where he is expected to co-chair a foreign ministers’ gathering of the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation mechanism. He will be the highest-ranking Chinese official to visit the Southeast Asian nation since the military coup last year.

Foreign ministers from five Lower Mekong nations – Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia – will also attend the meeting amid ongoing tensions over the water resources management and dam construction.

Wang will then visit Thailand, where the Apec summit will be held in November, the Philippines and Malaysia, before attending a G20 meeting of foreign ministers in Indonesia, according to the Chinese foreign ministry.

Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for the ministry described Southeast Asian nations as “important partners that share vast common interests and seek common development” with China, adding that Wang’s trip came at a critical time when the world was “fraught with turbulence and change”.

He said Beijing hoped to step up strategic communication, “work for high-quality Belt and Road cooperation”, “boost economic recovery and uphold peace and tranquillity”.

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