Biden welcomes Japan, South Korea leaders for summit, drawing China ire

WASHINGTON – The highest leaders of Japan and South Korea met Friday with President Biden at Camp David – and it’s already making China uncomfortable.

Biden, 80, welcomed South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to the presidential retreat in rural Maryland at round 11:30 a.m., asking them: “Able to have some lunch?”

The president didn’t reply to a shouted query by a reporter asking what message the summit ought to ship China.

The trio have been anticipated to debate Beijing’s growing military threat, invasive surveillance efforts, and predatory practices in East Asia, in addition to North Korea’s nuclearization.

The historic tri-lateral assembly involving former adversaries has irritated the Chinese language authorities, with Overseas Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin telling reporters Friday that the assembly represents a need to show the Western Pacific into “a wrestling floor for geopolitical competitors once more.”

“No nation ought to search its personal safety on the expense of different nations’ safety pursuits and regional peace and stability,” Wang mentioned. “… Makes an attempt to cobble collectively varied exclusionary groupings and produce bloc confrontation and army blocs into the Asia-Pacific are usually not going to get help and can solely be met with vigilance and opposition from regional nations.”

“The worldwide neighborhood has its truthful judgment on who’s stoking conflicts and exacerbating tensions,” he added, apparently referencing the US.

Relations between Tokyo and Seoul have been tense for many years after Japan colonized the Korean Peninsula in 1910 and held it via the top of World Warfare II.

The 2 nations established diplomatic ties in 1965, however laborious emotions stay — most notably over Japan’s treatment of Korean “comfort women” throughout the colonial interval and Tokyo’s refusal to apologize or pay reparations.

Whereas the US has formal alliances with each South Korea and Japan, the latter two are usually not allied with one another.

Lingering tensions have sophisticated American diplomatic and army efforts within the area.

For instance, when US forces conduct troop workouts with each nations throughout instances of heightened political stress, People have needed to operate because the intermediary in communications between their allies.

Beijing has repeatedly expressed considerations over the bettering ties between Japan and South Korea, with China’s prime diplomat Wang Yi final month dramatically telling attendees from each nations at a discussion board in Qingdao that they may “never become a Westerner.”

“Irrespective of how blonde you dye your hair, how sharp you form your nostril, you’ll be able to by no means change into a European or American, you’ll be able to by no means change into a Westerner,” Wang mentioned. “We should know the place our roots lie.”

In an obvious try to persuade Tokyo and Seoul not to isolate Beijing, Wang Wenbin on Friday inspired the group to work towards peace within the Pacific.

“In a world of change and dysfunction on the safety entrance, all events ought to act on the imaginative and prescient of a neighborhood of shared safety for mankind, observe true multilateralism, and collectively handle varied safety challenges,” he mentioned.