Over the past two years, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has made three tours of South-east Asia, where he visited all 10 Asean countries. On each, he came with offers of vaccines, economic aid and investments to a pandemic-battered region.
When Asean and China commemorated 30 years of dialogue relations last November, China's largesse was also on display - in addition to vaccines there was a pledge to buy up to US$150 billion (S$203 billion) worth of farm products from Asean over the next five years. "China was, is, and will always be Asean's good neighbour, good friend and good partner," said President Xi Jinping then.
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