Description: Vietnamese president To Lam met with Chinese president Xi Jinping in Beijing where they discussed further strengthening the mutual trade partnership. Lam has been recently reelected as the country’s president and China is his first state visit where he reportedly would aim to curate balanced ties with both China and the US. Vietnam and China despite having competing claims for the South China Sea are also close trade partners with Vietnam importing more than $200 billion worth of goods from China last year. Xi Jinping also met with Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov and UAE’s president Mohamed bin Zayed al Nahyan, in the past couple of days as he coordinates the current economic and geopolitical crisis.
Impact: China is exploiting the ongoing crisis in the Middle East to strengthen and draw more countries closer to its orbit of influence, providing much needed predictability in strategic fields such as trade and security. China would likely continue to expedite economic conditioning as the highest form of foreign policy to draw regional countries such as Vietnam even closer under its influence. To Lam’s immediate visit to Beijing demonstrates the imbedded relationship between the two countries, despite Vietnam’s precarious position in respect to the US as Vietnam’s largest export market. Through the intense leadership meetings, Xi Jinping manifests Chinese foreign policy as one of trade codependence and cooperation instead of militaristic approach towards forming alliances.