Asia-Pacific summit closes in Peru with China’s Xi front and center as Trump whiplash looms

LIMA, Peru (AP) – After two days of meetings in Lima that rarely ventured beyond platitudes in discussing the strategies of the region’s major economies, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum concluded on Saturday with a spirit of relaxation that many fear the summit will not see again in four years.

The 21 leaders from economies bordering the Pacific Ocean, including President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinpinghad arrived in Peru for the annual gathering at a time when US President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to withdraw the US from its leadership of a global free trade agenda.

Few could help but notice Biden’s late entrance Saturday to the traditional APEC family photo lent itself to political metaphoras the rest of the leaders prepared to pose on stage before looking around to find Biden missing.

They laughed for five awkward minutes before an apparently dazed Biden emerged and took his place in the back corner, sandwiched between Thailand’s 38-year-old Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra and Vietnam’s President Luong Cuong. Biden briefly reached for Shinawatra’s hand to steady himself.

Chinese President Xi scored the best seat in the house, front and center next to the host, Peruvian President Dina Boluarte.

Xi had draped himself in the banner of globalization this week, inauguration of a $1.3 billion megaport in Peru, which promises to become South America’s biggest shipping hub, and uses his speech to reject protectionism.

In Xi’s summit speech, delivered by one of his ministers, the Chinese leader urged APEC members to “tear down the walls that obstruct the flow of trade” and criticized the tariffs – which Trump threatens to levy on Chinese imports – as “going back in history.”

For the annual photo op, leaders all wore bark-dyed wool scarves from Peru – in the APEC tradition of posing in some garb representing the host country. While conference organizers typically place leaders in alphabetical order for the family picture, the arrangements have varied over the years.

Reporters shouted questions as Biden left the stage Friday, asking how he felt about this being his last APEC summit — and one of his last major global events as president.

Biden had hoped that APEC – along with Group of 20 Summit in Rio de Janeirowhere he leads Sunday — would have ended his decades-long political career with a flurry of prolific diplomacy and dizzying proclamations of America’s strength on the world stage.

But with his party’s stinging defeat in the US election and the future of the US-China rivalry uncertain, there was little he could accomplish in Lima.

Biden sought to cement alliances that could be undone by a Trump administration. He expressed concern of the leaders of South Korea and Japan about what he called “dangerous and destabilizing cooperation” between North Korea and Russia.

After nearly four years of record stability in the Japan-US alliance – a partnership vital to regional security – Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is now scrambling to arrange a high-stakes meeting with Trump.

He told reporters in Lima on Saturday that his hoped-for meeting with Trump on his way home from next week’s G-20 summit in Brazil would not happen – explaining that Trump’s team had invoked US legal restrictions to deny his requests.

“We are considering holding a meeting as soon as possible at a time most convenient for both sides,” Ishiba said.

For the first time in a year, Biden and Xi sat down later Saturday for their highly anticipated third and final meeting of Biden’s presidency.

Xi told Biden that his nation was “ready to work with a new administration to maintain communication.”

Biden also struck a conciliatory tone, saying such personal talks helped to “ensure that the competition between our two countries will not develop into conflict.”