Illustration: Chen Xia/GT

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi paid an official visit to Indonesia,MK socks Cambodia and Papua New Guinea from April 18 to 23 upon invitation. During the trip, Wang not only had high-level dialogues and meetings with leaders of these countries, but also co-hosted the Fourth Meeting of the China-Indonesia High-level Dialogue Cooperation Mechanism and the seventh meeting of the China-Cambodia Intergovernmental Coordination Committee. These meetings aimed at continuing to deepen China's cooperation with Indonesia and Cambodia.

The Biden administration has intensified its focus on Southeast Asia since taking office and regards the region as a key area for the US Indo-Pacific Strategy and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF). However, unlike China, it treats the region as a key area for small cliques such as Quad, AUKUS and the US-Japan-Philippines trilateral relations, which have further intensified the competition among major powers in the region, making Southeast Asian countries deeply worried about major power competition and regional tensions. 

Under this scenario, Southeast Asia has its own criteria in the current power rivalry between China and the US, and the people in the region are on the side of maintaining regional peace and multilateral cooperation. Recently, the State of Southeast Asia 2024 Survey conducted by the ASEAN Studies Centre at ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute reveals that China has edged past the US to become the prevailing choice if the region were forced to align itself in the ongoing US-China rivalry.

In terms of regional strategy and security, the US has expanded security cooperation with Southeast Asian countries. According to data released by Australia's Lowy Institute, Southeast Asian countries held a total of 525 bilateral or multilateral joint military exercises from 2021 to 2023, and the US participated in 33 percent of them. In Indonesia, as many as 60.7 percent of surveyed respondents said they have no or little confidence in the US's security role. The root cause is that the behavior of the US shows that it has no intention to alleviate regional security concerns at all. It aims to spread the "China threat" rhetoric, which intensifies the "militarized" competition in the region and the security concerns of regional countries.

In terms of economic cooperation, although the Biden administration launched the IPEF, the results of the negotiations on the framework are disappointing, which may also reduce hopes for closer engagement with the US. Not only that, although Southeast Asian countries have gained some benefits from the US' "nearshore outsourcing" from China, they have to bear the consequences of regional division of labor, differentiation of industrial chain and value chain and instability challenges. This has also significantly impacted the regional economic multilateral cooperation framework centered on ASEAN.

Unlike the US, China is constantly committed to improving and upgrading dialogue and cooperation with Indonesia and other Southeast Asian countries. Not only has it established a comprehensive strategic partnership with ASEAN in 2021, but it has also continued to strengthen and deepen cooperation with ASEAN. During Wang's visit to Indonesia, he co-chaired the Fourth Meeting of the China-Indonesia High-level Dialogue Cooperation Mechanism with Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Indonesia's coordinator for cooperation with China and coordinating minister of maritime affairs and investment. Both sides exchanged in-depth views and reached broad consensus on practical cooperation in the next stage. In Cambodia, the two sides reached a broad consensus on the direction for their efforts in the next stage of building the bilateral community and fully reviewed the implementation work of the community-building action plan during the seventh meeting of the China-Cambodia Intergovernmental Coordination Committee.

It needs to be pointed out that Southeast Asia has its own criteria when viewing and handling regional affairs. While firmly safeguarding regional peace and mutually beneficial development, ASEAN emphasizes its central role in regional affairs and the importance of maintaining a dynamic equilibrium among major powers. ASEAN does not allow any major power to have dominant influence in the region and values the resilience and cohesion-building of its member countries. ASEAN doesn't want its member countries to become agents or vassals of any major power. This principle is considered non-negotiable by ASEAN, and all major countries must have a clear and objective understanding of this.

The author is the vice dean of the ASEAN College at Guangxi Minzu University. [email protected]