Sawt Falasteen - Rubio to meet China's Wang on sidelines of ASEAN talks

Rubio and Wang's first face-to-face meeting since US President Donald Trump returned to office comes as Washington and Beijing are locked in disputes on everything from trade and fentanyl to Taiwan and technology.

Rubio, a longtime China hawk, and Wang are in Kuala Lumpur for a gathering of foreign ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which Japan, South Korea and Australia are also attending.

US officials said ahead of Rubio's first trip to the region as secretary of state that Washington was "prioritising" its commitment to East and Southeast Asia.

Rubio said Thursday the United States has "no intention of abandoning" the Asia-Pacific region.

But US tariffs have overshadowed the conference and Rubio has sought to placate Asian trade partners, saying talks were ongoing and might result in "better" rates than for the rest of the world.

Trump has threatened punitive tariffs ranging from 20 to 50 percent against more than 20 countries, many of them in Asia, if they do not strike deals with Washington by August 1.

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said this week that tariffs were being used as "sharpened instruments of geopolitical rivalry".

Wang on Thursday called for a "fairer and more reasonable" international order.

"At the same time, we are also confronted with challenges such as the impact of unilateral protectionism and the abuse of tariffs by a certain major country," Wang said.

Tensions between Washington and Beijing have ratcheted up since Trump took office in January, with both countries engaging in a tariff war that briefly sent duties on each other's exports sky-high.

At one point the United States hit China with additional levies of 145 percent on its goods as both sides engaged in tit-for-tat escalation. China's countermeasures on US goods reached 125 percent.

Beijing and Washington agreed in May to temporarily slash their staggeringly high tariffs -- an outcome Trump dubbed a "total reset".

- Taiwan, South China Sea -

Before becoming Secretary of State in January, Rubio had already been one of the most vocal critics of China on the American political stage for many years.

Rubio and Wang are also likely to discuss US concerns over China's expansionary behaviour in the South China Sea and Beijing's growing military pressure on Taiwan.

China claims the democratic self-ruled island as part of its territory and has threatened to use force to bring it under its control.

Like most countries, Washington has no formal diplomatic relations with the island.

However, the United States is Taiwan's biggest arms supplier and has shown increasing support for Taipei in the face of Beijing's growing military pressure on the island in recent years.

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth accused China in late May of "credibly preparing to potentially use military force to alter the balance of power" in the Asia-Pacific region.

He also claimed that Beijing "trains every day" to invade Taiwan.

In response, Chinese diplomats accused the United States of using the Taiwan issue to "contain China" and called on Washington to stop "playing with fire".

H.Darwish--SF-PST