Indo-Pacific? Not from where China is sitting

The region is leading global development and Trump wants America to be first

As US President Donald Trump and some of America’s democratic allies talk up a vision of “Indo-Pacific” cooperation, China is determined to ensure that the future belongs to “Asia”.

The increasing use of the phrase “Indo-Pacific” by Trump and his team during their marathon Asian jaunt this week, instead of the “Asia-Pacific” term that has long been common in business and diplomacy, is being greeted with thinly-veiled sneers in Beijing.

“Trump choosing to use the term and actually making it happen are two totally different things,” Diao Daming, an American studies expert at Renmin University in Beijing, told a forum on Friday.

“The