EP84: China Comes to Town: President Xi’s Visit to Malaysia with Assoc Prof Khoo Hing Yooi
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Welcome to Straight Talk Southeast Asia. This is a podcast that covers current developments in the region, particular countries, domestic politics, as well as regional issues. We look in depth at what is happening, why it might be happening. We speak to analysts, academics from the region, based in the region, and to better understand what's happening and what might be the projections of what's happening ahead. We're now in our second season.

I'm Bridget Welsh. I'm a political analyst and academic who's worked on Southeast Asia for many decades. I was raised here. I'm living here. And very importantly, I care about what's happening in the region. Thanks for joining me. Welcome to Straight Talk Southeast Asia. You're with Bridget Welsh and Zach Abouza. This is episode 16 of season three. Thanks as always for listening in.

It has been an extremely eventful week in Southeast Asia. Southeast Asia gained international attention with China's important visit to the region. Xi Jinping made a visit to Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia. These visits represent an important strategic realignment that is happening in the region as a result of actions taken by the Trump administration,

as well as recognition that we're in a new global order on the part of Southeast Asian countries. The first visit was to Vietnam, where the Vietnamese gained significant investment from the Chinese. The attention also was on the three-day visit, which was after 12 years, to Malaysia. During this visit, Xi Jinping and Anwar Ibrahim discussed the forging of golden years of the relationship

Anwar Ibrahim was very frank in his remarks, talking about China as a reliable and steady partner, to quote, steady and resolute, unyielding, even in the face of harsh winds and unreasonable treatment. The Malaysian government sent a clear message of the concerns about what's happening with the tariffs. And we're going to see more of this in our conversations between Zach and Dr. Ku, who will talk about the Malaysia visit in greater depth.

Xi Jinping also visited Cambodia on the day of a holiday and a very important sensitive anniversary where we mark 50 years of when the Beijing-led Khmer Rouge came into Cambodia, trying to create an agrarian classless society. Research has found that between 1.5 and 3 million people were killed. But this timing, however, was one that showed

For many people, recognition, this is also when the United States left Cambodia. This date had important salience sending a message that China is there. China is the regional hegemon. China is the one who is already important and continue to be important for the region's economy.

It's interesting that the three countries that China visited are all countries that have been engaging with hedging with the United States. The younger leadership in Cambodia has been hedging. Anwar Ibrahim's government has professed that it can be neutral, tried to work with all. Vietnam has been very strategic in its engagement with both China and the United States. All three are facing serious tariff issues of which they're going to have to negotiate.

But the visit from China and Xi Jinping represents symbolically and substantively the changing hegemonic relationships within Southeast Asia, the declining influence of the United States. One has to reaffirm that the United States' activities engaging in what I call the double coercive damage, the removal of aid and humanitarian aid, as well as the imposition of very coercive tariffs, has been impactful, more substantively,

The fact that the U.S. continues to see Southeast Asia as an extension of China as opposed to countries with her own interests and drew a different lens has had a very negative effect. Now Southeast Asia is being used as an extension of trying to harm China. Unfortunately, the Southeast Asian countries and Southeast Asian people are the ones very much in the target line. Also in Southeast Asia, we saw significant developments within ASEAN.

Henri Ibrahim went to Bangkok to meet with Minh-El Lhan, a man who was wanted by the ICC for criminal genocide of the Rohingya and continues to be engaged in crimes against humanity. One of his generals spoke out about the need for killing children just before the meeting and saying that killing children were justified. This really speaks to the thinking of the generals who continue to wreak havoc for the Myanmar people.

Nevertheless, the meeting took place with the aim of trying to garner and build the possibility of extending the ceasefire. Anwar Ibrahim's meeting was able to lead to the professed release of 4,800. The real challenge, however, is that the junta and Minang Line is not trustworthy. And we can see through the actions that have happened in managing the earthquake, as well as the long record of criminality and against humanity,

that there are really serious concerns of working with this government, especially giving it legitimacy. There was, however, a silver lining from the meeting in that for the first time we see that ASEAN openly acknowledges that it met with the National Unity Government.

This led to many of the ethnic armed groups demanding that they also get public recognition of meetings. And I think we may see a shift in recognizing openly multiple stakeholders, especially as the credibility of the junta as a player comes to light.

They are releasing prisoners, but they're holding the population of Myanmar captive. We also see a situation where there are serious concerns about the supposed ceasefire when there are continued bombings that are taking place. It's been three weeks since the Myanmar earthquake, and I think it's important to acknowledge how serious the damage has been.

In terms of death toll, officially what we've seen is 3,726 people killed with 5,105 people injured. There's still 129 people missing, according to OCHA information. We did see the important role of rescuers and medical workers that helped to contribute to saving 653 people and recovering 753 bodies.

But the damage extends now to basic needs. Three weeks after the earthquake, many people of the 17 million that are affected, 1.9 in the really concentrated areas, have no basic necessities.

There have been 65,000 buildings destroyed, 2,500 schools, 4,300 Buddhist monasteries, 6,000 pagodas and temples, 350 hospitals, 170 bridges, 586 dams, and 203 section highways have been significantly damaged. Napi Ngo, the capital of Myanmar, built by the junta, 70%.

of the buildings in Naypyidaw have been destroyed. Many of now the offices are moving back to Yangon, very symbolic and substantive move. The junta itself is talking about redesigning the capital. Capital symbolically and substantively has been destroyed by the earthquake. Majority of people are really suffering. Aftershocks continue. Three weeks later, there are still problems of major supplies.

And there is an issue of resources. And let me emphasize from what we understand from people on the ground, the need for financial support for livelihoods and for basic needs is serious. There are important legitimate organizations that you can help to support. If you have a few funds, do consider because people there continue to suffer.

Also in Southeast Asia, Vietnam has engaged in a very ambitious restructuring push. It is going to move the provinces of cities from the current 63 to 34 by September. This has been led by the General Secretary of the Communist Party, Tho Lam. This is a very unprecedented move of shifting the nature of administrative patterns. We're going to continue to be talking about this issue in greater depth here on Straight Talk.

Next week, we will also be talking about the Singapore elections, which were called for May 3rd. And this will be the test of the 4G generation. We already see from the candidate list, many young people being slated to contest.

There is a lot going on here in Southeast Asia. And as always to the listeners, thank you very much for listening in. For those of you celebrating Easter, may I wish you have a blessed Easter. And for those who have just finished celebrating the new year in Cambodia and Myanmar and Thailand, I hope that you've enjoyed your holiday and that all of you have a blessed Easter.

All of us here can find the region as it struggles and as it deals with the challenges valiantly, bravely, and boldly that we can look to the year with hope, even as we're dealing with very significant issues that the region are facing.

Hope you're enjoying listening to this episode. If you want to find out more about previous episodes, you can reach this on the website, straighttalksoutheastasia.com. The link should also be available in the show notes. If you want to contribute to the production costs of the podcast, you can hit the link, buy me a coffee. Every little penny counts. All that money will not go to me, but go to the producers who are helping me to put the show together. Thanks for listening.

In the shadow of the threat of U.S. tariffs that would cripple Southeast Asia's export-led economies, Chinese President Xi Jinping made a three-country tour to Southeast Asia, stopping first in Hanoi,

which has a $123 billion trade surplus with the United States, before traveling on to a three-day trip to Malaysia and a one-day trip to Cambodia. Xi clearly wanted the countries to reject decoupling, supply chain disruption, and unilateral imposition of tariffs. He was taking clear swings at the United States government.

Here to discuss Malaysia's response and the tectonic shift in regional orientation is Dr. Koo Ying Hui, Associate Professor of International Relations and Human Rights at the University of Malaya. Dr. Koo, thank you for joining us. Thank you.

President Xi arrived in Malaysia to great fanfare. What do you think Malaysia wanted from the visit? And it's a visit that Anwar had been seeking since he took office. As we know, President Xi, or the Chinese president, the last visit was 12 years ago. Certainly, President Xi's visit this time around, in 2025,

It's very significant, apart from the last year was our 50th anniversary between the two countries. And I must say that in the recent years, we have also seen the relationship between China and Malaysia has been getting much closer, with a lot of different trade and infrastructure projects going on between these two countries. This visit is made more significant because of the Trump 2.0 and the time of the tariffs, as everybody is talking about.

But I think coming from Malaysia's perspective, we also see this opportunity certainly for Ibrahim as the prime minister, who is the longest waiting to be a prime minister in this country.

that during his administration, we have seen a lot of foreign visits to overseas and also people coming into the countries. We also see Ibrahim wanted to build this middle power manship for Malaysia as well. I think all this tied up is what I must say. At the same time, it's quite an exciting time in Malaysia, but at the same time, there was a lot of cautious tones coming from different stakeholders as well. What were the immediate outcomes of the visit?

If you look at every newspaper now, a lot of newspapers even draft up the graph of 31 deals, MOU, together with China. And it's a long list of the MOUs that are happening with various ministries.

And we can see the big ceremonies of each minister shaking hands with the Chinese counterpart of the MOUs. And I think that some of it certainly needs more of the refining and tuning of what's the content of it, what kind of MOUs. And I think the MOUs stretch from not only trades, but also going into the media as well as the education. I think these 31 MOUs are certainly very significant.

In Kuala Lumpur, President Xi urged Southeast Asian nations to reject recoupling, supply disruption and tariff abuse. Is this an inflection point? Do you see this as a reordering of the political and economic landscape in the region? Before he's faced it, coming from China, they've been talking about community of shared future.

If we look at a lot of Chinese documentaries, videos that they produce, there's always signaling these communities coming from the voice of Asia in a way. I think that's what the presidency is portraying right now in terms of the Trump 2.0. And I must say that

Trump 2.0, in fact, also gives a big opportunity in terms of China's influence. And not only influence, but also a strong presence of China in the region by portraying China as stable partners. The presidency also portrays the leadership whereby when you watch over the videos, you don't see him speaking in a way like Trump.

It is two very different leaders. Having said so, I think with Trump's rather erratic way of dealing with world affairs, this will certainly open up a bigger door for China to establish a lot of relationship in the region. At the same time, I think what's also interesting is that China's visit, especially in the context of Malaysia, has invited quite a lot of debates.

You can see that some people are happy about it with the very close relationship, but there are also voices. They would prefer Malaysia to be a little bit more cautious and also to put forward on some of the conditions as well. I must say that one of the local newspapers who has recently approached me, it is an English newspaper that audiences use.

young people, they approached me with a different angle in looking at the China's visits to Malaysia. That is to look at what are the impacts on our younger generation. And I think that is something that's very interesting to actually look at, at least in the long term, what will be the impact of the influence in the country such as Malaysia. Are there political liabilities for this outreach to China?

In the parliament, as we know that in Malaysia, it is a unity government. I have not seen especially UMNOs coming with a lot of different opinions. And I think UMNO has been rather quiet in this as well, and they go along with it. But I think on the other side, there have been quite a number of issues that have been raised. For instance, the local newspaper, Singju Daily, has mistakenly put the flags, only the Malaysian flags,

All this has been turned into the discourse of China's influence indirectly, although it doesn't look directly, but I think it indirectly has shown how the public view such a close relationship.

China is having a very easy time now presenting itself as this steady, reliable trade partner in clear juxtaposition of the United States. But China has incredible industrial overcapacity. And to what degree could they simply overwhelm Malaysia? A lot of their investment in Southeast Asia

has really threatened local production.

If we look at Timor-Leste as one of the examples, Timor-Leste is one of the countries in Southeast Asia that has been always put into limelight about the relationship with China. And now you can see, while China is not the largest development funder to Timor-Leste, but they really focus on the infrastructures along with Japan and several other partners as well. But in Timor itself, you can feel a significant tension as well.

of how the public are unhappy with it. One of the arguments that appear in all of these countries is the losing of the small-medium enterprises, the small businesses to the Chinese. This has directly impacted especially people at the lower-income group.

This is not something that is small, but it's quite serious. And that dissatisfaction builds up. There are also the groups that I think a lot of governments have not been putting a lot of attention to how to deal with it when the businesses are being taken over somehow. There's also very little support coming to these lower income groups in terms of building their own businesses and to compete as well. Yeah.

Even before the threat of imposing 24% tariffs, Abnestor Anwar was unhappy with the United States. And we can see it in terms of U.S. policy for Israel in the Gaza war, going back to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the U.S. trying to impose end-use warrants.

requirements on Malaysian semiconductors. Can you talk about the state of U.S.-Malaysian relations right now?

During that time, I think including our former ambassador to United States, Dr. Srinath Sri Aziz, also he got himself into the troubles of holding the placard of making America great again. So I think there was certainly more periods of high tension when the Gaza crisis happens. And that certainly impacted the relationship between the U.S. and Malaysia.

The terrorists came in and then the China's came in more significantly publicly. But I do not see Malaysia's government under Anwar Ibrahim wanted to take the approach of retaliation or going in sticks towards the United States, despite of the disagreements of several issues.

This has been made very clear as well. If you look at the speeches from Anwar Ibrahim during the presidency's visit, there was no mention specifically of the countries, but it was mentioned indirectly in the speeches of the dissatisfaction

The whole world is unhappy with the United States. Malaysia is not alone. The stake of Malaysia to be more vocal is high because there are a lot of alliances that come together in expressing their dissatisfaction with the United States.

Malaysia has the third largest trade surplus, with the United States and Southeast Asia behind Vietnam and Thailand at roughly $23 billion. How do you see bilateral negotiations going forward? Or will ANWR continue to push for a regional negotiation strategy?

Even before the Trumps, UNWAS foreign policies have been quite diversified. One of the examples that we can use is him being more significantly present in the BRICS. Now that we have the Indonesia and I think Malaysia at that time was also talking about joining the BRICS. But at the same time, I think there was also a lot of other trade agreements such as RCEP and many others.

All this happened before Trump. The foreign policy has already shown how Anwar is aspiring to be a bigger regional power. So there is certainly an opportunity to level up the malicious positions in the regions and at the global as well. While there's a trade surplus and threats for the terrorists, but I wouldn't say that

All this only happened after the tariffs. Even before the tariff, we already see that diversification. Malaysia holds the presidency of ASEAN this year, and it's in that context that the prime minister flew to Bangkok, where he met the pariah, the leader of the coup in Myanmar, Min Aung Hlaing. What are your takes from that meeting? What should we expect from Malaysia moving forward?

First, he met up with the military junta leader and then after that, he met with the NUG. There has been quite a bit of discussion of him meeting up with the two different leaders in trying to make a deal of the ceasefire. But I think when Malaysia become the ASEAN chair, one of the very first things that Anwar did was the appointment of the special envoy to Myanmar, Osman Hashim. I would say that

the diplomacy approach by Anwar Ibrahim, it can be a risky one by putting the tools on the same table because it can also backfire at the same time that stability is something that can be very subjective. They can agree for the ceasefire just like the Gaza as well. They call for the ceasefire but the situation was still very bad. Certainly this diplomacy will

It is something that has gone beyond the ASEAN norms, which is applaudable, certainly. But the cautious tones will still be there on what will then be lead to the situation in Myanmar and including what happens to the elections. It will be a long journey before the Myanmar go back to hopefully wherever that they should be. Do we risk legitimizing the junta by having these meetings?

Initially, there was a lot of debates about the legitimizing of the military junta by engaging with them because there was an approach that there would be disengagement. The argument was that the engagement is needed because of the humanitarian crisis as well after the earthquake.

I must say that there are really two sides of arguments in looking at this. But the legitimization risk certainly is still there if by putting them onto the same table and calling for the ceasefire, but did not eventually bring up to the peace and order back in Myanmar. This will be quite complicated later. The military continues to launch airstrikes on civilian populations.

Yes, correct. That's why there is this risk of bringing them two together is commendable. But there is a high risk of what if this kind of ceasefire is not being dealt with the long-term consequences being bearing in mind. It can also make it even worse by then. Joining us today was University of Malaya's Dr. Kuying Hui. Thank you so much for joining us. It was such a pleasure to talk to you.

Thank you very much, Aznaq. Thank you for listening to the episode. Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast listening app. If you'd like to keep up to date on current Southeast Asian political affairs, just keep following. This is Bridget Welsh, and I look forward to connecting to you in the next episode. Straight Talk Southeast Asia is produced by Norman Chella, a.k.a. Norm, and you can find him at thatsthenorm.com. Thanks so much for listening.