BANGKOK: The signing of the world’s largest trade pact will likely be kicked back to 2020, according to a draft statement by Southeast Asian leaders, delaying a deal craved by China as it seeks to temper the fallout from a painful tariff war with the US.
The 16-nation Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) spans from India to New Zealand and includes 30 percent of global GDP and half of the world’s people.
Objections by India have dampened hopes of finalising the pact at this weekend’s Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit in Bangkok, where members of the 10-nation bloc have been joined by the premiers of India and China.
“Most market access negotiations have been completed and the few outstanding bilateral issues will be resolved by Feb 2020,” said a draft agreement obtained by AFP.
Negotiations have sputtered for several years, but the statement said the text of all 20 chapters was now complete “pending the resolution of one” member, believed to be India.
But it said all members were “committed to sign the RCEP” next year in Vietnam, which will take over the ASEAN chair.
New Delhi is worried its small businesses will be hard hit by any flood of cheap Chinese goods.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi repeated his country’s concerns during talks with ASEAN leaders on Sunday.
Modi said India’s unresolved issues include “meaningful market access for all parties”, according to a diplomat who attended the meeting, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity.
Beijing sees RCEP as a central pillar of its trade strategy for its Asian neighbourhood, and it is backed by the leaders of ASEAN and who represent a 650 million-strong market.
Concluding the deal has been made more pressing by the brutal tit-for-tat trade war with the US, which has chipped back at growth in China, the world’s second-largest economy.
