S. Korea, US exchange ideas on economic initiative against China: source
South Korea and the United States exchanged broad ideas about a US initiative to diversify global supply chains away from China last year, but the discussions remained conceptual, a diplomatic source said Thursday.
The remarks came a day after Keith Krach, undersecretary of state for economic growth, energy and the environment, said that he and South Korean officials talked about the Economic Prosperity Network (EPN) initiative during the allies’ Senior Economic Dialogue (SED) in Seoul in November.
Krach has been spearheading the US effort to promote the EPN, seen as a scheme to break China’s global dominance, in the midst of an intensifying rivalry between Washington and Beijing over regional primacy in various fields, including security and technology.
