Xi should stop pressing its neighboring countries

Xi should stop pressing its neighboring countries. September. 05, 2016 06:58. by 허문명논설위원 angelhuh@donga.com.

At a summit meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama held in Hangzhou, Chinese President Xi Jinping clarified its objection to THAAD deployment. “China objects to the deployment of the THAAD missile in Korea and urge the U.S. to respect China's strategic security interests,” said President Xi. Stressing the previous stance that the deployment is no way directed at China and directed at the threat from North Korea, President Obama is known to respond that the United States maintains its commitment to the security of its allies. Having five times of bilateral meetings up to date, this is the first time that the two heads showed such an explicit conflict over pending issues of the South China Sea and THAAD deployment.

It is a source of concern that China disregards the sovereignty of its neighboring nations, pressing them with its power even though President Xi is championing the cause of peace in his rhetoric. China has severed the cable of Vietnamese petroleum vessel and blocked the access of Indonesian fishing boats, ignoring the ruling by international arbitration tribunal, which said China’s building of an artificial island in the South China Sea is illegal. President Xi, however, called for an end to the Cold War in his opening speech of G20, which is all too contradictory to what China has been doing to its neighboring countries.

There is a possibility that the summit meeting on Monday between President Park Geun-hye and her Chinese counterpart fall short of the expectation, only confirm‎ing the different stance of the two nations on THAAD deployment. It is important for South Korea to protect the sovereign power of security, while preventing the conflict over the U.S. anti-missile defense system from affecting other matters related with China. “South Korea and China should analyze and admit the different positions over the issues, from which they should find the clues for compromise,” the Hwajeong Peace Foundation and the Institute 21 for Peace Studies established by The Dong-A Ilbo said at a symposium among Korea, China and Japan. The annual symposium is jointly held with the Hwajeong Peace Foundation and the Institute 21 for Peace Studies, the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations and the Asahi Shimbun. “THAAD is not only a regional issue on Korean Peninsula but an international matter among super powers such as China and the U.S., which makes it all the more difficult to be compromised,” Professor Shunji Hiraiwa from Kwansei Gakuin University said.

At the meeting with President Park on Saturday, Russian President Vladimir Putin didn’t directly mention about the THAAD issue. In July, Putin and Xi signed a joint statement to oppose the deployment of THAAD in Korean Peninsula. “We reached an agreement that the two nations do not accept the self-proclaimed nuclear status of Pyongyang,” Putin said after the meeting with South Korean President Park Geun-hye, still avoiding mentioning THAAD. It could be seen as South Korea’s diplomatic achievement to induce Russian position of this extent as Russia, one of permanent members of the UN Security Council, opposed against THAAD along with China. Seoul needs to enhance its diplomatic relations with Moscow to make the nation realize that standing up for Pyongyang would make it further isolated from the international community.