South Korea is moving away from its economic dependence on China and is increasing trilateral exchanges with the United States and Japan. So far, Beijing seems unsure how to respond other than asking for “cooperation” and encouraging Seoul to pursue a foreign policy of non-alignment.
An important measure of the impact of the evolution of South Korea's geopolitical orientation is reflected in changes in South Korea's trade relations. The United States will become South Korea's largest export destination in December 2023, surpassing China for the first time since 2004.
South Korea also recorded a trade deficit of $18 billion with China, the first bilateral deficit with China in 31 years. In 2023, South Korea's exports to China decreased by 20% from the previous year to $124.8 billion, and imports from China decreased by 8% from the previous year to $142.8 billion.
A strong flow of investment into the United States by major South Korean conglomerates has increased South Korean exports of cars, car parts, and car batteries. If these trends continue, in 2024 South Korea could become the only country adjacent to China where China is not its largest trading partner.
A decisive impact on bilateral relations came in December 2023, when the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Resources announced an order to stabilize South Korea's supply chain and reduce its dependence on China to less than 50% by 2030. The aim was to announce the “3050 Strategy'' concept.
The Trade Ministry's efforts to reduce dependence on China in supply chains are a response to South Korea's growing awareness of its vulnerability to possible Chinese economic retaliation.
The effects of deepening geopolitical conflicts are clearly contributing to the reconfiguration of political and economic relations in Northeast Asia.
As South Korea's investments in the United States strengthen the Yun administration's geopolitical choices, South Korea appears to be moving away from China's geoeconomic orbit.
Meanwhile, China's diplomacy with Seoul is moving forward rapidly, driven more by multilateral meetings involving both countries than by a sense of strategic purpose.
Ministerial and working-level economic dialogues between China and South Korea continued on issues such as supply chain stability, export controls, and trade facilitation, but these dialogues are not necessary for substantive bilateral talks. It did not generate any significant traction.
Bilateral and trilateral foreign ministers' meetings held in Busan with South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin, Foreign Minister Wang Yi, and Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa also failed to generate enough momentum to set a date for resuming the China-Japan-South Korea summit. There wasn't.
mixed signal
Prime Minister Han Deok-soo's visit to China in September 2023 will be the first by a South Korean prime minister in more than four years, and there are growing expectations within South Korea that Chinese President Xi Jinping will visit Seoul for the first time since 2014. Ta.
Han requested China's support for South Korea's bid to host the 2030 Busan Expo and for the Yun administration's “bold efforts” against North Korea.
President Xi emphasized the importance of “friendly cooperation” and said that South Korea “cooperates in the same direction as China, [and] We will take policies and actions that reflect the importance we place on the development of China-South Korea relations.”
However, Lu Chao, a professor at Liaoning University, told the Global Times that political tensions caused by President Yun's pro-American approach and comments on Taiwan could “make it difficult to revive the tripartite cooperation mechanism” between China, Japan and South Korea. “This poses a significant barrier.” .
Another development that impacted bilateral relations between China and South Korea was the announcement of a joint US-South Korea effort to counter disinformation.
The signing of the U.S.-Korea Memorandum of Understanding took place on the occasion of U.S. Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Liz Allen's visit to Seoul in December and reflects South Korea's concerns about false propaganda and global disinformation campaigns.
The signing of this memorandum is even more remarkable in light of reports that during the Moon Jae-in administration (2017-2022), China's Ministry of National Security attempted to hack the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and infiltrated the computer network of the presidential palace. .
missed opportunity
ASEAN and APEC's annual meetings have long provided national leaders with the opportunity to hold summit meetings, including Yin's meeting with President Xi at the G20 summit in Bali in November 2022. However, at the APEC meeting held in San Francisco in November 2023, only greetings were exchanged between Mr. Xi and Mr. Yun.
Similarly, South Korea's preparations to host the first summit-level talks with China and Japan in 2023 have failed to bear fruit, despite Xi expressing his desire to visit Seoul during his meeting with Han.
President Yun and Premier Li Qiang held two short talks in quick succession on the sidelines of the ASEAN and G20 summits in early September. Yun expressed his hope that North Korea's nuclear issue will not become an obstacle to improving China-South Korea relations. Premier Li stressed the need to expand cooperation to “pursue mutual benefits and win-win results.”
Sinologist Zhan Debin revealed the obstacles to realizing a China-Japan-ROK summit in a sharp column for the Global Times titled “South Korea needs to prove its sincerity for the China-Japan-ROK summit.'' The article challenges the proposition that South Korea will be able to elicit greater respect from China based on its closer ties with the United States and Japan, arguing that South Korea is instead becoming less “independent.” ing.
Second, Mr. Zhang said that Mr. Yun disavowed the understanding of the Moon administration's “three prohibitions and one restriction” regarding THAAD missile defense and that China's “red lines should not be crossed” regarding Taiwan, the South China Sea, and Xinjiang. It points out that it is being ignored. Zhang concluded, “If South Korea is promoting trilateral talks between China, Japan, and South Korea under instructions from the United States, it would be better not to hold the talks in the first place.''
attempt a trilateral summit meeting
Amid this rhetoric, China participated in the China-Japan-South Korea high-level meeting held in Seoul in late September and a meeting with South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin. These meetings were accompanied by a more optimistic tone in the Global Times, which emphasized the constant “gains in cooperation and losses in conflict” that result from economic interdependence, economic development, and close geographic and cultural ties. Emphasized the framework.
However, Chinese commentators reacted negatively to the virtual Japan-U.S.-South Korea defense ministerial meeting, which was held in parallel to the U.S.-South Korea Security Council in Seoul in mid-November.
Lu Chao of Liaoning University suggested that the strengthening of military cooperation between Japan, the US, and South Korea after the Camp David summit contributed to the worsening of tensions on the Korean Peninsula. Li Haidong of China Foreign Affairs University argued that such a relationship would make South Korea's security situation even more unstable.
Park Jin met with Wang Yi on the sidelines of the trilateral foreign ministers' meeting of China, Japan, and South Korea held in Busan at the end of November. The South Korean side read out the bilateral talks to strengthen mutual understanding, strengthen strategic communication, promote economic cooperation, people-to-people exchanges, and promote peace and prosperity in the region and the world through the restoration and normalization of cooperation between China and China. joint efforts to contribute to the future were emphasized. Japan and Korea.
The Chinese read-out provided a more detailed account of Wang's explanation of the changing international and regional situation and its impact on China-South Korea relations. “China and South Korea are neighboring countries, and this objective fact will never change,” Wang stressed, insisting that cooperation is the only way to build a relationship of mutual trust and respect.
The reading of the trilateral talks between China and South Korea with Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa emphasized efforts to institutionalize cooperation through trilateral summit meetings as soon as possible and deepen substantive trilateral cooperation. .
In addition to the foreign ministers' meeting, the three countries successfully held the 16th Tripartite Health Ministers' Meeting for the first time in four years in early December.
Changes in regional orientation
How China will work towards closer ties between Japan and South Korea, and whether it will pursue a “win-win-win” relationship between the three countries, with “particular emphasis on Tokyo and Seoul demonstrating more strategic autonomy” It remains to be seen whether normalization will be achieved. – Or whether the Camp David summit will create further obstacles and constraints on China’s ability to expand its reach in the region.
Yun's term in office is set to end in 2027, and the South Korean government is expected to continue focusing on close trilateral cooperation with the United States and Japan and reducing dependence on the Chinese market. If China does not take a more proactive approach towards South Korea, its relations with South Korea may have weakened considerably by then, even if a friendly president takes office.
Scott Snyder (ssnyder@keia.org) will become Chairman of the US-Korea Economic Research Group in Washington, DC in April 2024 and is a Senior Advisor to the Pacific Forum. Siwon Byun (sbyun@sfsu.edu) is an assistant professor of international relations at San Francisco State University.
This article was originally published by Pacific Forum and is republished with permission. This article summarizes the author's chapter from the January 2024 issue of Comparative Connections, which can be read in full. here.
