国际英语资讯:Yearender: Manila ushers in new era of Sino-Philippine relations under Duterte as China exten_时事

国际英语资讯:Yearender: Manila ushers in new era of Sino-Philippine relations under Duterte as China exten

"With the TPP's fate uncertain," Dominguez said Duterte's "China pivot could not have come at a better time, especially with the Philippines chairing ASEAN next year on its 50th anniversary as a regional bloc."

Dominguez said the Philippines is more than ready to chair the ASEAN meetings in 2017, as Duterte "had apparently foreseen correctly the need to turn ASEAN's attention toward China, the world's second-largest economy that wants to establish a larger economic presence in the Asia-Pacific region."

Dominguez recalled how Duterte "had come under heavy fire for this sharp foreign policy turn, earning harsh criticism from certain sectors in the process, only to be seen as the leader who had presciently seen that a timely pivot to China is in the best interests of not only the Philippines, but of ASEAN as a whole."

Dominguez has said in previous interviews that the Duterte administration is more open to the RCEP than TPP, given its new policy of moving the country swiftly towards economic integration with its fellow-members in ASEAN and major trade partners in Asia and the Pacific.

"With the TPP now apparently dead in the water and a growing resurgence of protectionism in the U.S., Manila's recalibration of its foreign policy would benefit not only the Philippines, but would also help the rest of ASEAN move closer to China and its vast trading market," Dominguez said.

Last December, the Philippine senate voted 20 to 1 to ratify the Philippines' membership in the Beijing-based Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Duterte is sending his economic team to China in January next year to firm up infrastructure projects that will be funded by the AIIB.