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Tillerson Hails U. N. Sanctions, as Chinese Minister Rebukes North Korea at Asean Meeting

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Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson called the sanctions “a good outcome, ” but the Chinese foreign minister told the North not to “provoke the international society’s good will.”
MANILA — A day after the United Nations Security Council passed its toughest sanctions against North Korea, Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson met with his South Korean and Chinese counterparts here in hopes of ratcheting up pressure on Pyongyang.
In a midday conclave on Sunday with Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha of South Korea, Mr. Tillerson hailed in his typically understated fashion the United Nations vote, which could cost North Korea nearly $1 billion a year, or about one-third of its foreign earnings.
“It was a good outcome, ” Mr. Tillerson said with a smile.
Mr. Kang, sitting across the table from him, could not resist chiming in: “It was a very, very good outcome.”
Despite Mr. Tillerson’s obvious glee, though, the man of the moment here at the annual ministerial meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or Asean, was the Chinese foreign minister, Wang Yi, a dashing diplomat who unlike Mr. Tillerson held a news conference and direct talks with his North Korean counterpart, Foreign Minister Ri Su-yong.
Mr. Wang said the two had had “an intensive conversation, ” and in unusually strong terms, he later urged North Korea to show restraint.
“Do not violate the U. N.’s decision or provoke the international society’s good will by conducting missile launching or nuclear tests, ” Mr. Wang said.
He also said, “Of course, we would like to urge other parties like the United States and South Korea to stop increasing tensions.”
A year ago, the Chinese were on their heels in this region. An international tribunal in The Hague last July delivered a sweeping rebuke of China’s behavior in the South China Sea, including its construction of artificial islands, finding that its expansive claim to sovereignty over the waters had no legal basis.
The case, brought against China by the Philippines, seemed like a turning point in China’s disputes with a host of regional players, including Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam.
A few months before that ruling, 12 nations in the Pacific region concluded more than seven years of negotiations by signing the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, a trade agreement that bound much of Southeast Asia together with the United States and Japan in an economic partnership intended to fight China’s growing economic hegemony in the region.
While China had its own regional trade accord, the United States-led pact had become the preferred agreement, with several nations that had missed out on the initial round of negotiations expressing interest in joining in a second round.
How things have changed.
President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, elected last year, has backed down from his country’s insistence that China abandon the shoals at the heart of the tribunal’s decision, preferring instead to accept significant Chinese economic assistance.

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