김대종 세종대 교수__더코리아타임즈__Seoul under growing pressure to join

[김대종]

Minster of Trade Yeo Han-koo, left, shakes hands with U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai at the Korea-U.S. FTA Joint Committee meeting held at Shilla Hotel in central Seoul, Nov. 19. Yonhap
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By Kim Bo-eun
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Washington is ramping up pressure on Seoul and other key allies in Asia to become part of a U.S.-led economic framework it is seeking to set up as a means to combat China's growing influence in the region.
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Key officials in charge of U.S. economic policy are making a series of visits to Korea in a bid to ensure the country's participation in the initiative, as Seoul has been caught in the middle of the world's two superpowers while seeking its own best interests.
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U.S. Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy and the Environment Jose Fernandez is on a trip to Tokyo and Seoul this week, and is expected to seek Korea's reaffirmation of its participation in the framework in a meeting with his counterpart Choi Jong-moon, Friday.
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The U.S. State Department said last week that the under secretary will discuss collaboration on a positive economic agenda for the Indo-Pacific that increases prosperity for U.S., Japanese and ROK citizens, as well as other people across the region.
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Fernandez's visit to Seoul will come a month after U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai visited Seoul, in a trip to allies in Asia that included Japan and India, on essentially the same mission. U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo also visited Japan, Singapore and Malaysia in a similar timeframe, to introduce the new, U.S.-led Indo-Pacific economic framework.
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Korea, which relies on the U.S. for defense capabilities while China is its largest trade partner, is seeking to increase its leverage, as Korean companies could face problems if the government chooses to prioritize one market over the other.
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Recently, voices have grown urging Korea to reduce its trade dependency on China, after experiencing a supply crunch in diesel exhaust fluid (DEF), also called "urea water," which resulted from Beijing cutting exports of a key DEF ingredient.
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On Monday, the finance ministry said it has officially initiated steps to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), as a strategic measure to better deal with the U.S.-Sino power struggle. The U.S. formerly led the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) as a means to contain China's growing influence, but withdrew from the multilateral framework in 2017, under the former Donald Trump administration. China and Taiwan have also applied to join the CPTPP.
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The CPTPP, the successor to the TPP, is a free trade agreement between Canada and 10 countries in the Asia-Pacific region and South America ― Australia, Brunei, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. The CPTPP would be the one of the world's largest free-trade areas by GDP.
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"Korea needs the utmost engagement with both the U.S. and China. With Washington, it needs to maintain a strong defense alliance and with Beijing, solid trade relations," Sejong University professor Kim Dae-jong said. "At the same time, Korea needs to join multilateral frameworks such as the CPTPP to expand its trade territory and gain greater leverage."
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출처 : https://m.koreatimes.co.kr/pages/article.asp?newsIdx=320462