[CTC] Obama to push TPP, TTIP agenda on Asian trip

[Arthur Stamoulis]

Obama to push TPP, TTIP agenda on Asian trip

By Doug Palmer <https://www.politicopro.com/staff/doug-palmer>, Politico Pro

President Barack Obama will highlight the benefits of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and try to advance talks on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership when he travels to Vietnam this weekend and then Japan next week for the Group of Seven industrialized nations meeting, administration officials said today.

White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters that both the TPP and regional security issues will be a heavy theme of Obama's three-day visit to Vietnam. He will have bilateral meetings with Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong in Hanoi on Monday and also give a speech reflecting on the dramatic improvement in relations between the two countries over the past decades.

On Tuesday, Obama will participate in a pair of events in Ho Chi Minh City focused on building U.S.-Vietnamese economic ties and the TPP pact, Rhodes said.

U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman will travel with Obama to Vietnam, which Froman described as a fast-growing consumer market for U.S. goods. Hanoi has pledged to eliminate high tariffs on U.S. agricultural and manufactured goods and to implement significant labor and environmental reforms under the TPP.

Froman said he expects to discuss the TPP ratification process at the G7 meeting in Ise-Shima, Japan, which will include the leaders of TPP countries Japan and Canada and major European powers Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Italy. 

The last four are key players in the TTIP talks that the United States and the European Union hope to conclude this year. The Ise-Shima summit will be an important opportunity for leaders to discuss the need to resolve outstanding issues in those talks "in a pragmatic and creative manner," Froman said. 

 
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