United States president Joe Biden, arrived in Japan this Sunday, the second and last leg of their first tour of Asia as a leader, against the backdrop of the North Korean threat, China’s geopolitical ambitions and the war in Ukraine.

After visiting South Korea, another great US ally in Asia, Biden arrived at Yokota Air Base, west of Tokyo.

The US president will meet on Monday with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Emperor Naruhito, and on Tuesday he will participate in a summit bringing together the leaders of Australia, India, Japan and the United States.

He will also introduce a regional trade initiative, the Economic Framework for Prosperity in the Indo-Pacific.

Biden Take the moment to greet Anthony Albanesewinner of the legislative election held the previous day in Australia and reaffirmed the “unwavering commitment of the United States to the American-Australian alliance”.

Message to North Korea

Shortly before leaving for Japan, Biden said this Sunday in Seoul that he was “ready” in the face of a possible North Korean nuclear test, but reaffirmed his openness to dialogue with a single message to Kim Jong Un.

“We are ready for anything North Korea can do,” Biden said, saying he was not “concerned” about the risks of a new weapons test during his stay in the region – something the US officials.

Finally, no nuclear test took place during Biden’s visit in South Korea, but it could still happen in the next few days, according to U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.

“If North Korea acts, we will be ready to respond. If North Korea does not act, it has a chance, as we said before, to get back on the table,” Sullivan told reporters on Sunday.

When asked by a journalist if Biden had a message for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the president responded with a laconic message: “Hello. Full stop”.

This is a way to make it clear that Washington remains open to talking to North Korea, even if there is no reciprocity. Talks in Pyongyang have stalled since the failed summit in 2019 between Kim and then-US President Donald Trump.

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In Seoul, where he arrived on Friday, Biden met with newly elected President Yoon Suk-yeol, a pro-American conservative who came to power in early May. The two leaders spoke intensify “joint military training in and around the Korean peninsula, ”criticizing the“ growing threat ”from North Korea.

Yoon noted that he discussed with Biden whether they should “develop different types of joint drills in preparation for a nuclear strike.”

He also identified the need chave “warplanes and missilesa change from the past when we only thought of nuclear protection as a deterrent. “

Any gathering of forces or expanding joint US-South Korea military exercises could anger Pyongyang, seeing the maneuvers as rehearsals for an aggression.

South Korean intelligence warns that North Korea has finished preparing for a nuclear test, which will be the seventh in its history and the first in five years. It does not rule out that this trial will take place before the end of the US president’s visit to Asia.

To add to the uncertainty, North Korea, whose population has not been vaccinated against Covid-19, is currently facing an outbreak, with nearly 2.6 million cases and 67 deaths, according to the latest official figures.

Biden and Yoon offered help to North Korea in dealing with its covid-19 outbreak.

As a sign of America’s ambitions in the region, Biden spoke at a joint news conference with Yoon of a competition between democracy and autocracy“in the world, and the Asia Pacific region is key to the dispute.

“We talked extensively about the need to expand it across the United States, Japan and Korea to include the entire Pacific and South Pacific and Indo-Pacific. I think this is an opportunity,” he said.

China was the main rival of the United States in that geopolitical fight.

Before leaving South Korea, Biden met with Hyundai chairman to celebrate the auto giant’s decision to invest 5.5 billion dollars at an electric car plant in the southern state of Georgia.

He also visited U.S. and South Korean troops based in the Asian country with Yoon, a sign of the “truly integrated nature” of the two countries ’economic and military alliance, according to a senior White House official.

AFP agency

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