China’s chief Xi Jinping began per week of diplomacy in Southeast Asia with a go to to Vietnam on Monday, signaling China’s dedication to world commerce, simply after U.S. President Donald Trump upended the worldwide economic system along with his newest tariffs strikes.
Chinese language President Xi Jinping waves as he arrives for a two-day state go to, at Hanoi’s Noi Bai Worldwide Airport, Vietnam, April 14, 2025.(Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters)
Though Trump has paused some tariffs, China was the outlier, as he has stored in place 145% tariffs on the world’s second-largest economic system.
Xi’s go to this week lets China present Southeast Asia it’s a “responsible superpower in the way that contrasts with the way the U.S. under President Donald Trump presents to the whole world,” said Nguyen Khac Giang, a visiting fellow at Singapore’s ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute.
China also can work to shore up its alliances and find solutions for the high trade barrier that the U.S. has on Chinese exports.
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“There are no winners in a trade war, or a tariff war,” Xi wrote in an editorial jointly published in Vietnamese and Chinese official media. “Our two countries should resolutely safeguard the multilateral trading system, stable global industrial and supply chains, and open and cooperative international environment.”
While Xi’s trip likely was planned earlier, it has become significant because of the tariff fight between China and the U.S., the world’s two largest economies. In Vietnam, Xi will meet with Vietnam’s Communist Party General Secretary To Lam, as well as the Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh.
“The trip to Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia is all about how China can really insulate itself” from Trump,” stated Nguyen, declaring that since Xi turned the president of China in 2013, he has solely visited Vietnam twice. That is his third go to and comes only a 12 months after he final visited in December 2023.
The timing of the go to sends a “strong political message that Southeast Asia is important to China,” stated Huong Le-Thu on the Worldwide Disaster Group. She stated that given the severity of Trump’s tariffs and regardless of the 90-day pause, Southeast Asian nations had been anxious that the tariffs, if applied, might complicate their growth.
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“Xi’s trip is to showcase how China is the opposite to the coercive and self-interested U.S. There will be a lot of expectations about what type of leadership and initiatives China is going to come up with at this time of crisis,” she stated.
Vietnam is skilled at balancing its relations with the usand China. It’s run underneath a Communist, one-party system like China however has had a robust relationship with the U.S.
In 2023, it was the one nation that acquired each U.S. President Joe Biden and China’s Xi Jinping. That 12 months it additionally upgraded the U.S. to its highest diplomatic degree, the identical as China and Russia.
Vietnam was one of many largest beneficiaries of nations making an attempt to decouple their provide chains from China, as companies moved right here. China is its largest buying and selling companion, and China-Vietnam commerce surged 14.6% year-on-year in 2024, in accordance with Chinese language state media.
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However the intensification of the commerce warfare has put Vietnam in a “very precarious situation” given the impression within the U.S. that Vietnam is serving as a backdoor for Chinese language items, stated Giang, the analyst at Singapore’s ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute. Vietnam had been hit with 46% tariffs underneath Trump’s order earlier than the 90-day pause.
China and Vietnam have actual long-term variations. They’ve disputes over territory within the South China Sea, and Vietnam has confronted off with China’s coast guard however doesn’t usually publicize the confrontations.
After Vietnam, Xi is anticipated to go to Malaysia subsequent after which Cambodia.