President Barack Obama said a commitment by eight other nations to join the U.S. in forging an Asia-Pacific trade accord within the next year is evidence that “American leadership is still welcome.”
Obama announced today that the officials agreed on a blueprint that will lead to drawing up a formal Trans-Pacific Partnership in the next 12 months, a deal that could create a model for expanded trade with more Asian countries.
Obama also said he would continue to press for reforms to address an undervalued Chinese currency that undercuts U.S. businesses as well as protections for intellectual property when he meets today with Chinese President Hu Jintao while at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Honolulu.
Obama is playing host to the APEC summit and will travel on to Australia and Indonesia, a trip that underscores renewed focus on Asia after a decade dominated by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The outreach is spurred by the rising commercial importance of the region and by China’s mounting economic and military power.
In the U.S. there are times when “we question our influence around the world,” Obama said in remarks directed to U.S. voters while attending a meeting with international chief executive officers. “But the news I have to deliver for the American people is American leadership is still welcome.”
Welcomed Re-engagement
He said he is “encouraged by the eagerness of countries to see the U.S. re-engaged in this region.”
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, who met privately with Obama, told reporters through a translator that he welcomed the renewed U.S. emphasis on the region.
Boeing Co. Chief Executive Officer Jim McNerney, who moderated the discussion with Obama, said expansion in Asia is “a huge opportunity for job creation here in the United States.”
One of the key advances Obama sought to deliver while in Hawaii was an agreement on the framework for the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. The current talks involve Australia, Chile, Peru and Singapore, all of which already have separate free-trade agreements with the U.S., as well as Malaysia, New Zealand, Vietnam and Brunei.
Two-way trade between the U.S. and those eight nations totaled $171 billion last year, compared with $457 billion with China, $181 billion with Japan and $88 billion with South Korea, according to the U.S. Commerce Department.
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