Positive developments in Asia

“The most economically vibrant region in the world,” is how China Premier Wen Jiabao immodestly but accurately described Northeast Asia at the recent Beijing summit. Financial fixation on Europe has led to shortchanging positive developments in Asia.

Businesslike Beijing discussions last month are useful for enervated Europeans in need of inspiration as well as investment, and other observers as well. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak also attended.

Asia leaders agreed to focus on negotiating a three-way free trade agreement. To generate momentum, they concluded by signing an accord on promotion, facilitation and protection of investment. This will further Asia’s expanding role as principal exporter of capital. The agreement will also encourage better protection of intellectual property.

As always, these economic accords should be evaluated in the context of long-term history. Japan occupied Korea and large parts of China until the end of World War II. China and South Korea were direct combatants in the Korean War.

Recent diplomatic moves by the United States regarding Northeast Asia should reinforce this new forward regional momentum. First, at the global Nuclear Security Summit, held in Seoul in March, President Barack Obama emphasized the importance of defending South Korea.

Appropriately, he visited the Demilitarized Zone that divides the two Koreas. The 1950-53 Korean War made the Cold War a global conflict, and there is still no formal peace treaty between the two sides.

Some criticized the visit as provocative. In fact, linking the historical record of a strong South Korea-U.S. alliance with current tensions with North Korea was shrewd as well as appropriate symbolism.

Second, the White House named Dartmouth College President Jim Yong Kim, who was born in Seoul, to succeed Robert Zoellick as president of the World Bank. This addresses widespread and growing international pressure to nominate a representative from the developing world for the top job, which by custom has always gone to an American.

The World Bank is a principal global economic development organization, which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. Ban Ki-moon, current secretary general of the U.N., is a career South Korean diplomat. Despite substantial challenges, the U.N. has not only maintained but strengthened international economic, peacekeeping and related cooperation.

Ban and Kim personify South Korea’s important expanding role as a bridge between developed and developing nations. The original vision of the United Nations combined competing goals of favoring the most powerful nations and inclusive global representation. The Security Council still is defined mainly by the nations that led the Allied victory in World War II. The General Assembly has remained inclusive even as the total number of nations has expanded greatly since the 1950s.

South Korea emerged from the Korean War as one of the poorest nations in the world. Per capita income was below even destitute Burma. Today, South Korea ranks as one of the largest economies in the world, with a stunning record of rapidly expanding industrial and commercial strength. It also has successfully developed representative government, with a turbulent but functioning political democracy.

The United Nations has become stronger. The goal of creating the U.N., which helped define the Allied leadership of Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt from an early point in World War II, has been confirmed.

South Korea is stage center.

Arthur I. Cyr is Clausen Distinguished Professor at Carthage College. E-mail him at acyr@carthage.edu <The Korea Times/Arthur I. Cyr>

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