China hosts Southeast Asian ministers as it competes with US

China is hosting foreign ministers from 10 Southeast Asian nations amid heightened competition between Beijing and Washington for influence in the region

BEIJING -- China is hosting foreign ministers from 10 Southeast Asian nations this week amid heightened competition between Beijing and Washington for influence in the region. Chinese state media said the meeting Tuesday in the southwestern megacity of Chongqing will cover issues from restoring tourism and other economic exchanges battered by COVID-19, to more coordinated efforts in fighting the pandemic and the feasibility of creating a vaccine passport to allow freer travel among them. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is also expected to meet separately with each of his counterparts on the sidelines of the conference. Beijing has been building influence with the 10 countries that make up the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, despite frictions with some of them over rival territorial claims in South China Sea. The Philippines has complained repeatedly over the presence of Chinese boats moored at a reef that it claims and Malaysia last week protested over an intrusion by 16 Chinese military aircraft into its airspace, calling the incident a “serious threat to national sovereignty and flight safety.”