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China can either benefit from Japan-South Korea tensions or try to ease them, says Kishore Mahbubani
- The Singapore Summit hears that ‘something has gone wrong’ with multilateralism in Northeast Asia
- Former China central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan says he is worried about a tech cold war
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The ongoing trade dispute between Japan and South Korea presents an “interesting dilemma” for China, which can either watch from the sidelines or try to bring both sides together, as the United States has done before, said former Singapore diplomat Kishore Mahbubani.
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With its neighbours starting to fight or compete on its doorstep, Beijing could benefit from the geopolitical opportunities arising from their conflict. Or it could adopt an “enlightened view” and attempt to ease tensions between Tokyo and Seoul, he said.
Japan and South Korea have in recent months clashed over territorial and historical disputes and have removed each other from a preferential list of trading partners. Japan’s export controls on South Korea are also threatening tech supply chains, with potentially severe consequences for regional economies already suffering from the US-China trade war.
“If China comes in and tries delicately and diplomatically to play the role of the stabiliser, this can change the chemistry of the region very significantly,” said Mahbubani, now a distinguished fellow at the National University of Singapore’s Asia Research Institute.
“The interesting question therefore to watch is, what is China going to do?”
Mahbubani was speaking on Saturday at the Singapore Summit, an annual business forum usually held in conjunction with the country’s Formula One race which is taking place this weekend. He sat on a panel focused on challenges for Northeast Asia.
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Mahbubani described the tensions between the US and China, and Japan and South Korea, as stemming from a geopolitical system that was evolving with different actors, from a “bipolar, unipolar, and now entering a multipolar world”.
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