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Pacific ministers commit to move ahead with pact without U.S.

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — cluding how to facilitate many cases on bilateral
Pacific Rim trade ministers membership for the origi- basis,” he told reporters.
meeting in Vietnam com- nal signatories.” “The president made the
mitted Sunday to move The ministers have tasked decision, which I certainly
ahead with the Trans Pa- their trade officials to pres- agree with, that bilateral
cific Partnership trade pact ent the assessment to their negotiation is better for the
after the United States leaders when they meet United States than multilat-
pulled out. for an annual the Asia Pa- eral negotiations.”
New Zealand Trade Minis- cific Economic Coopera- “But we certainly expect
ter Todd McClay said the tion summit in Vietnam in to stay engaged and I be-
remaining 11 TPP countries November, which will also lieve that at some point
are open to others joining include Trump, Russian that there’ll be series of
provided they accept the President Vladimir Putin bilateral agreements with
trade agreement’s high and Chinese President Xi willing partners in this part
standards on labor and Japanese Trade Minister Hiroshige Seko, center, Vietnam- Jinping. of the world,” Lighthizer
environmental protection. ese Trade Minister Tran Tuan Anh, bottom left, Peruvian They also underlined their added.
He said the door remains Trade Minister Eduardo Ferreyros, bottom right, Singa- vision for the TPP to expand He rejected criticism that
open to the U.S., even af- porean Trade Minister Lim Hng Kiang, top left, and un- to include other econo- the Trump administration
ter President Donald Trump identified Taiwanese trade representative attend a press mies, saying such efforts was embracing trade pro-
withdrew from the pact in conference a press conference after the Asia-Pacific would address concerns tectionism. “Our view is that
January, saying he prefers Economic Cooperation (APEC) trade ministerial meeting about protectionism, con- we want free trade, we
bilateral free trade deals. in Hanoi, Sunday, May 21, 2017. tribute to maintaining open want fair trade, we want a
“It’s clear that each coun- Associated Press markets, strengthening the system that leads to great-
try is having to consider rules-based international er market efficiencies in
both economic values and end there is a lot of unity together to come up with trading system, increasing the world,” Lighthizer said.
strategic importance of among all of the countries an agreement among 11 world trade and raising liv- The China-led 16-member
this agreement, but in the and a great desire to work that not only delivers for all ing standards. Regional Comprehensive
Vietnam and Malaysia had Economic Partnership will
of our economies and the been expected to be ben- meet Monday in Hanoi to
people of our countries, it’s eficiaries from the original further their discussions on
also open to others coun- TPP with greater access a separate deal seen as
tries in the world to join if to U.S. markets and invest- an alternative to the TPP. It
they can meet the high ments. The TPP was cham- is expected to be finalized
standards in the TPP agree- pioned by former President by the end of this year.
ment,” McClay told report- Barack Obama and was “I think confidence we
ers. seen as a counterbalance have shown in this meeting
Since the U.S withdrawal, to China’s growing influ- for the multilateral trading
Japan and New Zealand ence in the region. system for regional eco-
have been spearheading U.S. Trade Representative nomic cooperation within
efforts to revive the deal. Robert Lighthizer, mak- APEC can be a very good
In its current form, the TPP ing his international debut and strong signal that we
requires U.S. participation since taking office a week are united and we are
before it can go into ef- ago, defended Trump’s steadfast in fighting trade
fect. That means the re- decision to pull out of the protectionism and reduc-
maining countries would TPP. ing trade risks,” said Chi-
need to change the rules “We expect to engage nese Deputy Trade Minister
for any deal to go ahead, with members here in Wang Shouwen.q
and it would be signifi-
cantly smaller without the
involvement of the world’s
largest economy.
The 11 countries represent
roughly 13.5 percent of the
global economy, accord-
ing to the World Bank.
The trade ministers said
in a statement that they
agreed to launch a pro-
cess to assess options to
bring the agreement into
force “expeditiously, in-