South Korea, Vietnam leaders pledge closer ties as US tariffs shake up trade
There was no public discussion of the levies - 15% on South Korean products going to the U.S. and 20% for Vietnamese goods - as South Korean President Lee Jae Myung hosted Vietnam's To Lam as his first state guest since taking office in June.
But Trump's tariffs on products from Asian countries have increased uncertainty over future business commitments, with Vietnamese official data showing a slowdown in new investment.
Lam, the Vietnamese Communist Party general secretary, said they agreed to expand trade with each other to $150 billion by 2030 - from about $86.8 billion in 2024 - and that Vietnam welcomed an increase in investment by South Korean businesses.
"Our countries agreed that about 10,000 Korean companies operating in Vietnam contribute to Vietnam's economic development and mutually beneficial cooperation between the two countries," Lee said in a televised address.
"I asked for a continued interest in the stable economic activities of our companies in Vietnam," Lam added.
Lam led a delegation of industry, trade, foreign and technology ministers and senior party and parliament members on the four-day state visit.
The countries signed 10 memoranda of understanding, pledging cooperation in areas including nuclear and renewable energy, monetary and financial policies, and science and technology, Lee's office said.
Other agreements covered cooperation in infrastructure, including high-speed rail, Lee's office said.
In a speech at South Korea's Yonsei University, Lam urged South Korean companies to keep investing in Vietnam and warned of the risk of fragmenting supply chains.
"Vietnam welcomes South Korean enterprises to expand their investments in the country, emphasising substantive cooperation in technology," Lam said.
Lam said the countries should make it a top priority to jointly develop semiconductors and make breakthroughs in new materials, calling on Korea to keep nurturing Vietnamese talent in areas like AI, biotech and shipbuilding.
A number of major South Korean companies including Samsung Electronics have used Vietnam as an export hub, benefiting for years from lower labour costs, generous tax incentives and Hanoi's numerous free trade pacts with dozens of countries.
South Korean companies have been cited as potential investors in Vietnam's planned nuclear energy, LNG power plants and high-speed rail projects.
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Pilot union objects to India's call for global code of conduct on pilot poaching
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The Guardian
43 minutes ago
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We expected dominance but Peak China may finally have arrived
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By 2024, however, China's $18tn economy had fallen back to just over 62% of the almost $30tn of the US. In GDP per head terms, China is still no more than 20% of the US. A rising China uniquely lifted its share of global GDP between 2000 and 2021 from 3.5% to 18.5%, but since then it has slipped back to about 16.5%. There is no question that China's rise is at least stalling. The working age and total population are now in relentless decline. The urbanisation rate, just over 60%, is flattening out. Productivity growth has stalled. The long surge in China's share of global manufacturing exports and production has levelled off, and the external environment for China is now much harder and more hostile. A 90-day pause in the US-China tariff war is due to expire on Tuesday, and it is unclear whether it will be extended. Part of the problem is that China has reached the end of extrapolation. The past really is another country. 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The Guardian
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‘I don't expect to live a normal life': how a Leeds teenager woke up with a Chinese bounty on her head
It was Christmas Eve 2024 and 19-year-old Chloe Cheung was lying in bed at home in Leeds when she found out the Chinese authorities had put a bounty on her head. As she scrolled through Instagram looking at festive songs, a stream of messages from old school friends started coming into her phone. Look at the news, they told her. Media outlets across east Asia were reporting that Cheung, who had just finished her A-levels, had been declared a threat to national security by officials in Hong Kong. There was an offer of HK$1m (£94,000) to anyone who could assist in her arrest or capture. News reports included a photograph of her aged 11, seemingly the only picture officials had of her before she and her family left to resettle in the UK in 2020. 'I couldn't even really recognise myself,' she says. Cheung says she was still in a state of shock as friends started jokingly congratulating her on her infamy. 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The constitutional principle of 'one country, two systems', agreed with the British before the handover in 1997, was abandoned, with Hong Kong's pro-democracy parties later disbanding as the possibility of peaceful political change receded. 'At the time I attended my first protest [in 2019], I was expecting it to be completely peaceful because I was taught at school that we have freedom of speech and press in Hong Kong,' Cheung recalls. 'Then suddenly, the police started shooting teargas and rubber bullets at us and started arresting people really violently; dragging protesters and standing on their necks. I was just 14 and my worldview completely changed. 'I realised whatever we had been learning in school was a lie,' she says. 'I'd been brainwashed. I felt helpless and fooled.' Sign up to Global Dispatch Get a different world view with a roundup of the best news, features and pictures, curated by our global development team after newsletter promotion Thousands of protesters and opponents of the new powers were arrested and charged in a brutal crackdown that led to condemnation from countries including the UK, which offered residents in Hong Kong the chance to resettle. Although her parents were not political, Cheung says they could see that it was better for her and her younger brother's future to move to the UK. Her family, says Cheung, 'knew I was someone who doesn't know how to shut up. They didn't want either of us to end up in prison for speaking our mind, because my mum said, 'You are kind of nobody. No one would know that you're in prison.'' The family arrived in Leeds in 2020, where Cheung, then 15, threw herself into studying for her GCSEs. With the UK going through Covid lockdowns, she spent most of her time at home catching up on the syllabus and practising past exam papers. After a successful first year, she went on to study maths, further maths and economics for A-level. Her first taste of activism outside Hong Kong came at 18 after she made a submission to the UN on the experiences of women during the 2019-20 protests in the city. She was later invited to the UN office in Geneva to join an NGO meeting on the topic. It was here that she met members of the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong, which advocates for democracy. 'At that point I knew I could not afford to go to university yet [as she would have to pay the higher overseas tuition fees] so asked the committee if I could take a job working for them,' she says. 'I didn't imagine it would be a career and when I was hired it was just on a short-term contract, more or less as an intern,' says Cheung. 'I was happy just to save up money.' She soon began taking on a more public role at the committee, speaking to MPs and journalists while using her real name. She thinks it was this that irked Chinese officials. 'I spoke with a lot of media and my quotes were used as someone who was born and grew up in Hong Kong and so with a personal connection. The authorities saw that and intentionally want to target people who have got a profile.' After the bounty and warrant for her arrest were announced, Cheung says she did consider taking herself out of the public spotlight. 'But I thought if I do this now everyone will know it is because I am scared and giving up,' she says. 'They [China] want to stop others from speaking out publicly, but I know I am fortunate to have my family here in the UK.' However, it has not been easy. Cheung has faced an onslaught of sexual harassment and abuse via social media and was followed by two 'suspicious-looking' Chinese men to a restaurant after an event. She reported the incident to the police. She has had to change her address and is now cautious about meeting new people. In 2022, a pro-democracy protester demonstrating on the pavement was dragged into China's consulate in Manchester before being beaten up in a 'barbaric' attack. 'It was certainly because a UK police officer broke diplomatic protocol and stepped into the grounds of the consulate to save him that something worse didn't happen to that protester,' she says. 'He could have disappeared. It's just a matter of time before someone is kidnapped or killed, given how much China is escalating their overseas repression.' Aside from her personal safety, Cheung realises her public profile is now limiting her future choices in life. 'I have shut off a lot of job opportunities with any company that has business ties or trade with China. They won't hire me now. 'I don't expect to live a normal life, but compared with the people in prison back in Hong Kong, my sacrifice is nothing. I really want to see a free Hong Kong so if my public role can help the situation a little bit, it will be worthwhile.' A spokesperson for the government of the Hong Kong special administrative region said Cheung was an 'absconder hiding in the UK' and wanted for 'blatantly engaging in activities endangering national security'. They added that she would be 'pursued regardless of distance'.
