Interesting article on Kerry in Asia

[karynnj]

Last edited Fri Feb 5, 2016, 01:10 PM - Edit history (1)

The funny thing is that as they posit that his "hot diplomatic streak" might end with working with China on North Korea, the arguments essentially boil down to China will do what is best for them. They also bring up the neoliberal all time favorite that seems to be mostly just TPP - the pivot to Asia which I still don't get - because as HRC said - the President can't choose his issues.

However, though there is that pall over a meeting yet to have occurred, when they list his accomplishments recently and then a list that no one saw in 2004 on his accomplishments in Asia as a Senator. (In fact, until Prosense documented it, I never heard the good work he did in Cambodia,)

Kerry, whose recent diplomatic victories include the conclusion of an Iran nuclear deal and the release of U.S. Navy sailors and prisoners from Iranian custody, the re-establishment of ties with Cuba after decades of estrangement and a historic international agreement on climate change, has given less attention to Asia than his predecessor Hillary Clinton.

His focus on other regions has disappointed some Asian diplomats given that he's no stranger to the region, having famously fought with distinction in the Vietnam War, played a leading role in the re-establishment of diplomatic relations with Hanoi and helped set up a tribunal for surviving Khmer Rouge leaders in Cambodia while in the Senate.

So he may be keen to put a personal stamp on the Obama administration's Asia policy, which has so far yielded a massive Trans-Pacific Partnership designed to ensure Western rather than China-dictated standards underpin the regional trading system; tightened alliances South Korea, Japan, the Philippines and Australia amid Chinese territorial muscle-flexing in the East and South China Seas; and helped steer Myanmar out of isolation and through a political reform process.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/26/politics/john-kerry-north-korea-china-visit/


Note they missed his long shot important work on the US/China climate pact.


While it is understandable that NK is the big deal on this troop, they are missing a lot about this very trip. It started in Laos and Kerry is there to help Obama prepare for a conference with countries from that region that Laos is the current chairman of. In addition, Kerry was there to build on the efforts of Ben Rhodes and Tony Blinken for a bigger commitment to rid Laos of the unexploded bombs from the 1960s and 1970s. (Similar efforts were spoken of in Combodia.) https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/world/2016/01/22/john-kerry-discuss-unexploded-bombs-trip-laos/kz3Irm3OlwhgZOOUHifpeN/story.html

Laos is the most bombed country in history, posing a poignant challenge for Kerry, who served in the Vietnam War, then returned home to become one of its leading protesters and launch his political career.

“We thought we were a moral country, yes, but we are now engaged in the most rampant bombing in the history of mankind,” Kerry said on “The Dick Cavett Show” in 1971, long before the scope of the so-called secret war in Laos was publicly known.

Kerry played a big role in normalizing relations with Vietnam as a US senator from Massachusetts. As America’s top diplomat, he now emphasizes bomb cleanup efforts as he builds ties in the region.


Honoring the 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations last year, Kerry said the United States continues to “make real our pledge to help clear Laos of unexploded ordnance.”

In Laos, Kerry met someone working now - and since he met Kerry in the 1990s on finding the bodies of those killed in the Vietnam war.

In Cambodia, he met with the President, with whom he worked years ago on a way to have trials for the Khmer Rouge.

Years ago, as a member of the United States Senate Foreign Relations Committee, I traveled here several times in the 1990s to try to help find a way to hold the Khmer Rouge accountable for the terrible events of the killing fields where nearly two million people were killed. And I worked with Prime Minister Hun Sen and the UN to help create a structure that became the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. And we were able to break a gridlock between the government and the UN that resulted in accountability for the crimes of the Pol Pot era. Now, not everybody paid the price of that court. Pol Pot himself died before, as did some others. But there are those in prison today as a result of its continued work and accountability still continues.

I also was very privileged to chair the United States Senate committee that sought a full accounting for Americans lost during the war in Southeast Asia. And this is an effort in which Cambodian support was both sought and given. I will never forget one of my last trips here, 1999 – not the last, but in 1999 -- Ambassador Heidt was then an economic officer at the embassy. And on that visit I had the honor of meeting the late King Sihanouk and we discussed a shared common vision of a democratic, prosperous Cambodia at peace.

So I am very, very conscious, in returning here now in 2016, at the extraordinary distance that has been traveled by Cambodia, a country that has developed rapidly, seen its citizens now move into the – or just about to break the barrier of the lower end of middle income categorization. And this city, which, when I first came here, was a city of 350,000 people and a very war-torn economy is now a city of 2.2 million people with a very modern hospital, skyscrapers, enormous energy, and many, many tourists. So I am very conscious of how much progress has been made and how far we have traveled in our relationship.

This continues on the joint efforts they are doing with Cambodia.

http://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2016/01/251694.htm

If he was not also working on Syria and NK, these would be incredible important newsworthy efforts. One thing that runs through all of the many remarks pages on state.gov is the depth of his relationships from when he headed the POW/MIA effort.