Eastern Asia

November 8-9 marked Donald Trump’s visit to the PRC, which was his first trip there since his inauguration. We reiterate that Beijing became a central point for all stops over Donald Trump’s almost two-week long Asian tour.

Although the trends leading to the aggravation have not altogether disappeared, the absence of new missile tests or ambitious statements is perceived by the mass consciousness as a certain relax of tension.
However, the author would like to use this pause to once again illuminate on the non-obvious reasons that may influence further dynamics in an unfavourable way.

The period immediately preceding a series of current events held on the basis of the ASEAN (including the jubilee forum dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Association) was marked by some facts and occurrences that generally fit into the trends that have developed in recent years and concern the ASEAN member states, as well as individual leading world powers (USA, China, Japan).

Not long ago, the author described the situation on the Korean Peninsula as still at the red line, and although the past month seemed to be without incidents, we cannot say that the crisis has ended.

Not so long ago, we talked about the great purge of Moon Jae-in instigated to strengthen his political position. Without this, many of his projects, especially populistic initiatives, risk being buried, not unlike the similar ideas of his predecessors.

On 13 October 2017, the new presidential administration of the Republic of Korea filed a petition to the prosecutor’s office about the start of a new investigation into the tragedy of the vehicle-passenger ferry Sewol.

Our previous material on the process of ex-President of South Korea Park Geun-hye came out on the eve of 16 October, when the period of her detention was due to expire. By this time, she had attended 80 court hearings, but earlier accusations simply disintegrated: the ex-President stubbornly pled innocent and no definite evidence was found.