By Geoff Dyer, FT China bureau chief

Barack Obama made one last final attempt to speak directly to ordinary Chinese people at the end of his three-day visit, giving an interview in Beijing yesterday to Southern Weekend, one of China’s more outspoken newspapers.

Yet even that small gesture seems to have led to some minor skirmishes with the Chinese authorities, which managed to keep Obama on a fairly tight rein during his visit.

When the morning paper was delivered to lots of offices in central Beijing – including several buildings that house many foreign news organizations – it did not contain the section with the interview, even though the full newspaper with interview was available on many newsstands and on the internet here. After a call to the distributor, the section of Southern Weekend with the interview appeared mid-afternoon in the FT’s mail box.

The article itself raised some suspicions because it is relatively small and is almost drowned out by a large advertisement occupying more than half the page, which a source familiar with the matter said was inserted very late in the day. But there are no signs of censorship – the transcript released by the White House is identical to the published Q&A.

Obama did not say anything that would attract the censor’s ire. He called on China to “take on more responsibilities” – one of his main themes for the visit - and said that Washington would review the ban on hi-tech exports to China. And he told the interviewer he wanted to meet Chinese and Houston Rockets basketball star Yao Ming.

By Geoff Dyer, FT China bureau chief

Now that the Obama circus has left town, the biggest sigh of relief comes from the group of people often labelled as China’s “dissidents”: human rights lawyers, serial petitioners and democracy advocates. Even though the US president went out of his way to be diplomatic about human rights issues and did not have any extra-curricular meetings with independent intellectuals, Beijing still detained dozens of people and put others under house arrest.

A lot of the press comment on the Obama China visit has been pretty negative for the president, pointing out how hard he found it to connect with Chinese people and how little he had to show in terms of concrete results. But China’s weaknesses were also fully on display, from the no-question press conference in Beijing to the unwillingness to broadcast Obama’s “townhall” meeting in Shanghai. Chinese confidence may be rising and the Communist party firmly in control, but the ritual locking up of dissidents suggests China’s leaders still look over their shoulders with some anxiety.

In truth, this was the latest in a series of round-ups of the awkward squad over the last 18 months, starting with the Olympics last year, Hillary Clinton’s first visit to Beijing in February, the 50th anniversary of the Dalai Lama’s flight from Tibet in March and the 20th anniversary of the June 4th Tiananmen crackdown. When it came to the October 1 national day this year – which was also the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China – many dissidents did not need to be asked and opted for a quiet holiday in the countryside. 

The interesting question is whether the end of this cycle of sensitive events will lead to a modest relaxation. There were high hopes, for instance, that the Olympics would help loosen up China’s political system a little but it could be that all these high-profile events have strengthened the more conservative elements in the system.  Beijing’s control-freak tendency is still deeply-ingrained.

By Zach Coleman, FT Asia world news editor

Lee Myung-bak, the South Korean president, may have looked like he was bulking up ahead of Barack Obama’s first presidential visit to Seoul this week when he sported a sweater under his suit jacket.

In fact, Lee and his cabinet - who joined him adding some layers of protection - were trying to lead by example as they committed the country to cut its carbon emissions in a symbolically under-heated meeting room during a cold snap.

How Seoul will reduce emissions by four per cent from 2005 levels by 2020 has not yet been spelled out. But the track record of other leaders using sartorial gestures to promote energy conservation has been mixed.

Months after becoming US president, Jimmy Carter donned a cardigan to underscore that the energy crisis was the “moral equivalent of war”. Carter hoped to summon public solidarity to conserve energy and reduce oil imports through steps such as reducing wintertime heating and driving more efficent cars.

But in the heyday of the Pontiac TransAm, his plea for sacrifice didn’t resonate with the American public (how would Hummer owners react now?). Oil imports continued to climb and Carter was eventually sent packing by the sunnier optimism of Ronald Reagan.

Continue reading "How might Obama reduce his carbon footprint in South Korea?"

In this audio interview, Edward Luce, the FT’s Washington bureau chief, analyses the significance of President Barack Obama’s first visit to China.

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By Geoff Dyer, FT China bureau chief

Have we just watched the launch of the G2? As Barack Obama has said several times this week, there are few big global problems that can be solved without the agreement of the US and China. And talking in terms of a G2 captures some of the shifting balance of global power where a wounded US is seeking to find common cause with a rising China.

Yet there is only one main problem with the idea. No one actually wants a G2.

Let’s start with the people who really, really do not want a G2. Europe hates the idea because it would cement its declining relevance on the world stage. India, Brazil & Co see it as a challenge to their own global superpower aspirations.

Then there are the Chinese. The idea is flattering of course, especially to a people with such an in-built sense of being at the centre of the world.

But a real G2, where the US-China relationship acts as a clearing house for thorny international issues, would come with all sorts of leadership obligations which China is quite happy to let others (the US) fulfil.

And what of the US? Well, if the Obama visit has shown anything, it is that China does not give much away in these sorts of bilateral summits. More sanctions for Iran, more help in Afghanistan, a stronger currency? Thanks, but no thanks.

As Elizabeth Economy and Adam Segal argued in this perceptive piece earlier in the year, the US can exert much more pressure on China through multilateral approaches (i.e. ganging up with other countries) than through one-on-one meetings.

That leaves the only supporters of the G2 as us folks in the news media, for whom such a simple label for a complex reality is too irresistible.

By Mure Dickie, FT Tokyo bureau chief

The depth of Barack Obama’s pavement-scraping bow to Japan’s Emperor Akihito last weekend has become a matter of controversy at home drawing individous comparisons with the upright Dick Cheney  (see this Los Angeles Times blog).

So here’s my verdict on the president’s protocol performance.

First off, Obama definitely wins some credit for being so obviously keen to show respect for local feelings. This is an important message to convey given that his administration has been rather brusquely waving aside calls by Japan’s new government for a rethink on a controversial Marine base relocation plan.

Like people everywhere, the Japanese appreciate when visitors abide by the old injunction to “follow village ways when in the village” (the local equivalent of “When in Rome…”). And bowing is very much a part of Japanese etiquette.

Continue reading "Obama stoops but fails to conquer"

By Geoff Dyer, FT China bureau chief

Barack Obama’s efforts to reach out to ordinary Chinese on his Asia tour may have fallen a little flat, but there is one trump card he can play to score points with his hosts – the three members of Obama’s Cabinet who can get by in Chinese.

Two are Chinese-Americans, commerce secretary Gary Locke and energy secretary Steven Chu, both of whom are with the president in Beijing.

Locke did not learn English until he went to kindergarten, although he admits that he has lost some of his Chinese language skills since he was a kid.

Nobel-prize winner Chu did not really learn Chinese as a child, but has tried to study as an adult. And then there is Tim Geithner at Treasury who spent a couple of summers studying Chinese at universities in Beijing.

In Chinese financial circles, there are any number of people with immaculate English, but the upper echelons of the Chinese Communist party are not quite such a cosmopolitan bunch – the Cultural Revolution cut off educational opportunities for many of them.

Only one member of the current Politburo finished a university course abroad, vice premier Zhang Dejiang.

And Zhang did not exactly spend lazy days at the Sorbonne - he has an economics degree from the Kim Il Sung university in North Korea. I wonder if his course covered ‘global imbalances’?

By Christian Oliver, FT South Korea bureau chief

Seoul’s Chosun Ilbo newspaper last week speculated on the most important question surrounding the South Korea leg of Barack Obama’s Asia tour: whether the presidential lunch would be accompanied by Korean rice liquor, or a fruity Californian red?

On the eve of Mr Obama’s arrival in Seoul on Wednesay, officials said it would most likely be an American wine. The South Koreans probably intend those bottles of Californian wine to deliver a none-too-subtle message about the importance of a trade agreement between Washington and Seoul, currently held up mainly by resistance from US automakers.

But that bottle - Zinfandel? - could also raise deeper questions about trade deals with South Korea.

Continue reading "South Korea to woo Obama on trade with…Zinfandel?"