Global leaders head to Asia with trade, AI and security in focus

Résumé détaillé

MANILA: World leaders are set to gather in Asia for a series of high-stakes meetings covering issues from artificial intelligence (AI) to trade and, ...

MANILA: World leaders are set to gather in Asia for a series of high-stakes meetings covering issues from artificial intelligence (AI) to trade and, potentially, nuclear disarmament.

The 11-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) opens its final leaders’ summit of the year in Manila on Sunday, while French President Emmanuel Macron attends a Francophonie summit in Phnom Penh. Attention then shifts to the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Shenzhen, China. Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to be a key figure at APEC, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend the ASEAN meeting. US President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney will attend both.

Analysts said Trump’s recent midterm election defeat would not significantly change how the region sees him. “I don’t think the region will see him as a lame duck,” Siew Mun Tang, former head of the ASEAN Studies Centre at Singapore’s ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, told AFP. “He has two more years. He can do a lot of things.”

No meeting at APEC will draw more attention than a proposed sit-down between Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump and Putin, though its agenda remains unclear. Putin has pushed for talks on Ukraine, while Trump suggested this week that the focus would be on denuclearization and ending the war in Iran. Analysts urged low expectations. The Brookings Institution’s Ryan Hass said Xi and Putin would likely give Trump “a respectful hearing” on arms control but “agree on broad principles without committing to any follow-on actions”. A meeting Trump once hoped for with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears unlikely, with Pyongyang rejecting repeated overtures.

AI will be a major topic at APEC after Xi and Trump agreed in September to set up a “communication channel” for AI incidents. Despite the two countries’ fierce tech rivalry, calls for cooperation are growing amid shared concerns over bioweapons and infrastructure hacking.

In Manila, the…

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