Digital Press Briefing with Daniel J. Kritenbrink, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs

MODERATOR:  Greetings from the U.S. Department of State’s Asia Pacific Media Hub.  I would like to welcome journalists to today’s on-the-record briefing with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel J. Kritenbrink.  Assistant Secretary Kritenbrink will provide an overview of his visit to Singapore, Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Brunei.  He will also discuss the historic progress the United States has made with Southeast Asian allies and partners over the past two years in advancing an Indo-Pacific that is free and open, connected, prosperous, secure, and resilient.

And with that, let’s get started.  Assistant Secretary Kritenbrink, I’ll turn it over to you for your opening remarks.  Thanks for joining us.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Thank you, Katie, and thank you as always for hosting me, and I’m really excited to have this opportunity to engage with journalist friends in Southeast Asia and here in the United States as well, and really grateful to all of our colleagues at the Bangkok Media Hub for setting this up.  I really am excited to have the opportunity to chat with colleagues tonight.  I’m just back from an incredibly productive five-country trip to Southeast Asia last week.  I had the pleasure of visiting Singapore, Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Brunei, and I’m eager to share how these engagements, I think, further strengthened our commitment to the region and demonstrated that commitment – again, particularly to our friends and partners in Southeast Asia.

Before I dive into the specifics of each stop, let me just make a couple general framing comments about just how critical these relationships are to advancing our overall Indo-Pacific Strategy.  And I think you know that our Indo-Pacific Strategy is designed to advance a region that’s free and open, connected, prosperous, secure, and resilient.

And one key point that I made this past week in Southeast Asia to each and every one of my counterparts was this:  Despite the many global challenges that we collectively face, the United States remains squarely focused on the Indo-Pacific region.  I think you all know that we recently marked the second anniversary of our Indo-Pacific Strategy, and I emphasized to all of my counterparts that in accordance with that strategy, our top priority remains investing in the collective capacity of our allies, partners, and friends.  And I think we’ve made tremendous progress in advancing that strategy, especially in Southeast Asia.

Just a couple of highlights.  I’ll remind friends that we held the U.S.-ASEAN Special Summit in D.C. in 2022, and we of course continue to strongly support ASEAN centrality, the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific, and really honored to have upgraded our partnership with ASEAN to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.

I think friends are aware as well we’ve strengthened our ties with traditional allies and partners, including elevating our relationships with both Vietnam and India to Comprehensive Strategic Partnerships, and we’ve also increased engagement with other key partners in the region, including the Philippines.

We signed the IPEF Supply Chain Agreement and we substantially concluded negotiations of the Clean Economy Agreement and Fair Economy Agreement under IPEF, and we look forward to continuing discussions around IPEF, including with our IPEF Southeast Asian partners Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.

And of course, we continued our unwavering support for democracy in Burma.  In the three years since the coup d’etat, we have provided nearly $317 million in lifesaving humanitarian assistance and dedicated hundreds of millions of dollars to advance democracy, human rights, and justice for the people of Myanmar.

Now, I could continue listing our accomplishments in the region over the last couple of years, but why don’t I spend the remainder of my time focusing more specifically on my activities in the last week across the region.

In Singapore, I was absolutely delighted to join my counterpart Permanent Secretary Albert Chua to co-host the sixth U.S.-Singapore Strategic Partnership Dialogue.  And during our very productive conversations, we reaffirmed our nations’ wide-ranging partnership on defense and security, economic cooperation, critical and emerging technology, and climate and energy.  I was also honored to meet with Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan, and I took the opportunity to thank Singapore for its continued leadership in the region, including in ASEAN and in IPEF, and Singapore’s incredibly strong support for tackling today’s greatest challenges.

In Phnom Penh, I had a range of productive conversations with counterparts on how the United States and Cambodia can deepen our relationship and address issues of concern.  I met with new Prime Minister Hun Manet as well as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Defense Tea Seiha for what were really wide-ranging discussions on the whole range of issues before the United States and Cambodia.  Now, on the positive side that includes our cooperation on DPRK UN sanctions enforcement, condemning Russia for its war of aggression against Ukraine, and other cooperative areas, including related to law enforcement.  We also addressed candidly other areas, including areas of difference related to issues such as human rights, trafficking in persons, and creating space for free and independent media.

I also reiterated to Prime Minister Hun Manet that the United States remains committed to the Cambodian people and their aspirations for a more prosperous, democratic, and independent country where all voices are heard and respected, and where Cambodia’s sovereignty is protected.

In Bangkok, my Thai counterpart Permanent Secretary Eksiri Pintaruchi and I co-chaired a very productive ninth U.S.-Thailand Strategic Dialogue.  I was also honored the next day to co-host the second U.S.-Thailand Strategic and Defense Dialogue, or 2+2, alongside Ministry of Defense Permanent Secretary Sanitchanog and my DOD colleague Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Jed Royal.  And during those two dialogues, I was really gratified that we were able to reaffirm with our Thai allies our commitment to advancing our bilateral cooperation across a whole range of areas, including economic growth, climate change, global health, security cooperation, and people-to-people ties.  We also had an opportunity to discuss with our Thai allies shared concerns, including regarding the situation in Burma.

In Hanoi, I participated in the Asia-Pacific Dialogue, which was our first iteration of this dialogue since we upgraded our relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.  During the dialogue with my counterpart Vice Foreign Minister Nguyen Minh Vu, we further deepened our relationship and found new ways to facilitate our shared vision for, again, a prosperous, open, resilient, and peaceful region.  We also discussed the need to maintain peace, stability, and freedom of navigation in the South China Sea in the face of rising challenges there.  I was also delighted to meet with Vice Foreign Minister Ha Kim Ngoc as well as Chairman of the Communist Party of Vietnam’s Commission for External Relations Le Hoai Trung, in which we were able to discuss a broad range of other issues important to our partnership with Vietnam.

And last but not least, I was absolutely delighted to travel to Brunei, which was my first trip there ever.  Of course, this year marks our 40th anniversary of formal bilateral relations, and I was proud to mark the milestone with my friend Foreign Minister Dato Erywan, Minister of Finance Dato Amin, and Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Defense Dato Alirupendi.  I also had the opportunity to reaffirm our enduring bilateral ties and commitment to our strong partnership with Brunei.

So let me just sum up this rundown of my trip with, again, a reaffirmation of how proud I am of our efforts to strengthen our partnerships across all of Southeast Asia as well as our strong relationship with ASEAN.  These relationships continue to be critical to American national security and prosperity, and as the United States we are always looking for ways to boost our cooperation and demonstrate our ongoing commitment to the Indo-Pacific.  Again, we believe the Indo-Pacific is the region where much of the history of the 21st century will be written.  And perhaps more than anything, I was incredibly gratified by the close strategic alignment between the United States and our partners in the region in tackling our shared priorities together.

So, Katie, why don’t I stop there.  Sorry my opening was a little bit longer than usual, but after a five-country trip, I hope people will understand.  But now let’s get on to the main event and I’m delighted to take your questions.  Over.

MODERATOR:  Thank you so much, Assistant Secretary.  So now we’ll turn to the question-and-answer portion of today’s briefing.  Our first question came in in advance from Bui Mai of Nguoi Lao Dong newspaper in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam, who asks:  “What will the U.S. do to demonstrate its security commitment in the Pacific region to its Southeast Asian allies, including Vietnam?  And in the context of China increasing its military presence in the area, recently a ship collision with the Philippines, will the U.S. take any specific actions such as deploying military force to this area or not?”

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Katie, thank you, and thanks to our friends in Vietnam for leading us off with an excellent question.  Let me say just a couple of things in response.  First thing I’ll do is reiterate what I said in my opening remarks:  The focus of the United States in the Indo-Pacific – and including in Southeast Asia – is investing in the collective capacity of our partners so as to support the rules-based regional order and to advance our shared challenges.  And we do that across a whole range of domains, from working to combat pandemic disease and climate change to investing in the economic prosperity of our partners.  But also – related to your question – in the security domain, we also invest in the capacity of our partners.

And I would say in particular for many of our friends in Southeast Asia, especially the five claimant states, they are especially concerned about the situation in the South China Sea.  And our focus in our response to meeting those concerns is threefold.  First, we continue to focus on our diplomacy, including with partners in ASEAN, to make sure that all countries – including all claimants – base their claims in international law, that all claimants commit to recognizing and respecting freedom of navigation, freedom of overflight, and the peaceful resolution of disputes.

We also – secondly, we spend a great deal of time, effort, and money investing in building the maritime capacity of our partners, especially building an increasing maritime domain awareness.  So the United States has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in partners’ maritime domain awareness capabilities because we believe that the more countries are able to understand what is happening in their maritime domains and defend their own interests in the maritime domains, we further promote stability across the region.

And then thirdly and finally, the United States continues through our own operations to be physically present in the region on a daily basis, and we continue to fly, sail, and operate everywhere that international law allows, demonstrating thereby that all countries share those same rights.

So our goal, again, is to promote peace and stability, security and prosperity, promote respect for international law, peaceful resolution of disputes, but also ensure that countries have their own ability to protect their sovereignty and their own interests.  And we think if we do that, we maximize our chances of preventing miscalculation and conflict and, again, promoting peace and stability.

And I should be candid too:  I think we’ve seen in a number of instances where the People’s Republic of China has taken a number of steps in the South China Sea that both run counter to international law, but that also utilize coercion to intimidate partners in ways that we find deeply unacceptable and destabilizing.

Hope that answers your question.

MODERATOR:  Great, thank you.  I see we have a question from Kea Puy of Kyodo News based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.  “During your recent meeting with PM Hun Manet, did you raise any concern about Ream Naval Base?  If so, what was the response?  Also, did you raise the South China Sea issue?  If so, what were your concerns and reply from PM Hun Manet?  Thank you.”

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, thanks to our Japanese friends for asking another good question.  Look, as I hope I made clear in my opening remarks, I did have the opportunity to meet with Prime Minister Hun Manet and we had a very productive, very positive, and very candid meeting.  And we discussed a number of ways in which we would like to both deepen and expand the existing cooperation between the United States and Cambodia, but also address certain areas of concern.

Now, I will state just very clearly and transparently that we did discuss issues related to Ream Naval Base, and I think that as the United States has stated very clearly and transparently before, that the United States and a number of countries in the region have expressed serious concerns about the intent, the nature, and the scope of construction at Ream Naval Base as well as the role that the PRC military is playing in this process and in the future use of the facility.

But I do want to underscore while we had a very productive and candid exchange, it was a broad-ranging conversation.  Ream was one of many topics that we discussed, but again, I underscored – whether it was related to Ream or a range of other issues – again, America’s approach to the region is to ensure that our partners continue to have choice and that partners continue to be able to preserve their own sovereignty.  And that helped form the basis of my very productive conversation with Prime Minister Hun Manet.

I think you also asked about the South China Sea.  Obviously, I discussed the South China Sea really in all of my stops in the region, but we did not discuss it in detail with the prime minister.  We focused a bit more squarely on the bilateral relationship and some of the issues that I’ve outlined here this evening.  Thanks very much.

MODERATOR:  Okay, next we’ll go to the live queue.  We have Sangho Song of Yonhap based in Washington, D.C.  You should be able to unmute yourself now.

QUESTION:  Can you hear me?

MODERATOR:  Yes, we can.

QUESTION:  Okay.  Thank you very much for doing this, Assistant Secretary.  I have a question about North Korea.  Recently, U.S. senior official for DPRK Jung Pak and NSC official Mira Rapp-Hooper talked about the need for interim steps on a path towards North Korea denuclearization.  Can you comment on why officials have started to mention that expression “interim steps”?  We understand it is only natural to think that there should be interim steps towards the time-consuming denuclearization process, but interim steps are usually involving a nuclear freeze in return for sanctions relief and other incentives.  Can you elaborate on the reason why the officials started to use that expression “interim steps”?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, look, I very much appreciate your question.  Here’s what I would say.  The United States continues to be deeply concerned, along with our close allies and partners in the region, particularly the Republic of Korea and Japan – continue to be concerned with the range of destabilizing North Korean activities, including now a large number of ballistic missile tests and other provocative behavior that we find unacceptable.  We’ve continued to demonstrate, as the U.S. Government, that we will remain absolutely committed to the security of our partners and to the security of the United States, that we will carry out a number of steps to deter North Korea.  We will also continue to strictly enforce a range of sanction measures both in the UN context and also bilaterally and trilaterally.

At the same time, we have continued to indicate that the door remains open to North Korea to engage and to proceed down a better path that leads to denuclearization and stability in the region.  But I don’t have any new developments to share with you this evening, but I do appreciate your comment and I will say this too: that North Korea did feature in many of my conversations in the region, including in Southeast Asia, where I think it’s fair to say that countries across the entire Indo-Pacific remain deeply concerned about the range of actions that North Korea continues to take.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question comes to us from the Q&A tab, from Huong Doan of SOHA News in Vietnam, who asks:  “Would you mind telling more detail about the trip to Vietnam?  Was there any developments in IPEF negotiation and semiconductor cooperation?”

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, to my friend from Vietnam, I’m always delighted to talk about Vietnam, and it was a privilege to return to the country where I had the – again, the privilege of serving as America’s ambassador for three and a half years.  I would say that the conversations I had in Hanoi were – they were detailed, they were rich, they were incredibly broad-ranging and extremely candid.  We did talk about the economic and trade relationship, of course, which remains vitally important to our Comprehensive Strategic Partnership with Vietnam, but we also exchanged views on a whole range of security and strategic issues from the South China Sea to the situation in Myanmar to the Korean Peninsula.  We talked about our cooperation in a broad range of other areas, including on a range of transnational and global issues, including climate change and health.

Now, I would say that our economic engagement in IPEF and our cooperation in the high-tech sector also remains a really important element of the relationship.  We’ve certainly – again, in accordance with our strategy, we’ve demonstrated that we are invested in Vietnam’s success, literally and figuratively, including in Vietnam’s high-tech sector.  So we’re very grateful, actually, for the leadership role that Vietnam has played in IPEF thus far.  I think you saw from the announcements at the time we upgraded our partnership to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership last year during President Biden’s visit that our cooperation in the tech sector is really a critical, new, and exciting element of the relationship.  That will continue going forward.  Certainly it was a key element of my conversations, but I didn’t go to Hanoi to make any new announcements in that area, but I’m confident it will remain one of the most important and exciting elements of our relationship for decades to come.

MODERATOR:  Okay, next we’ll go to the live queue.  We have Giff Johnson from the Marshall Islands Journal.  Giff, you should be able to unmute yourself now.

QUESTION:  Thank you.  I know you’re focused on Asia because of the visit, and I’m just wondering, however, if you could comment briefly on where the Compacts of Free Association for the three North Pacific countries are headed given the holdup in congressional approval, but some developments over the last few days.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, Giff, thanks so much for your question, and I’m really delighted to be speaking with you.  Because even though my trip last week and the primary focus for this evening has been on my five-country trip in Southeast Asia, I think you know very well that the United States is committed to the entire Indo-Pacific, and in particular to the Pacific Islands.  I know President Biden was absolutely honored to host two U.S.-Pacific Island Forum summits in Washington, D.C.  He really benefitted from developing close personal relationships with leaders across the entire Pacific.

And I think as you know, our approach to the Pacific is – the way we’ve termed it – meeting our partners where they live.  In other words, in accordance with the 2050 Pacific Island Forum Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent, we have worked with Pacific partners to identify their key priorities, whether it’s related to combatting climate change or illegal fishing or focusing on economic development and people-to-people ties.  And then we’ve crafted a strategy to meet each of those needs and demands.

Now, in the North Pacific, I think particularly for out partners in the three Freely Associated States, obviously the newly renegotiated Compacts of Free Association have been the key focus for the last couple of years.  We were really delighted to substantially complete the negotiations for the new compacts, and of course we’ve been working with our friends on Capitol Hill to make sure that the implementing legislation for the compacts is in fact passed so that the newly negotiated agreements can come into effect and, of course, the United States can continue to provide the assistance that I think has played such a key role in our partnerships.

Look, we’ve engaged with our – with congressional leaders very intensively over the past several weeks and months to demonstrate the importance of the Pacific, the importance in particular of the Freely Associated States and the Compacts of Free Association.  Have been very pleased and excited to see the positive developments on Capitol Hill that you mentioned just a little while ago.  We’ll continue to watch closely work by leaders in Congress, but certainly the developments of the last week that we’ve seen are very promising and we very much look forward to early passage by the Congress of the compacts and then their full implementation.  And most importantly, once we do so, we can get back to the daily business of continuing to grow our partnerships in every possible way.

I hope that’s helpful and responsive to your question.  Really delighted to have you on the call tonight.

MODERATOR:  Okay, our next question goes to Pimuk, who comes to us from Radio Free Asia:  “What is the U.S. role in Thai Government efforts to deliver humanitarian aid to displaced people in Myanmar?”

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, this is a great question.  And look, I’ll say a couple of things.  First of all, I was really delighted to be in Thailand and to engage in the two dialogues that I did with our Thai allies – just refreshingly candid and cooperative and productive.  Those discussions were really focused on how the United States and Thailand can work together to make the region more prosperous and more secure.  I praised in great detail and repeatedly the Thai Government’s ongoing and longstanding efforts to support refugees who have fled from the violence in Myanmar, and also Thailand’s both historic strong support for providing humanitarian assistance to the people of Myanmar but also the more recent efforts by the Prime Minister Srettha government in the ASEAN context to, again, increase humanitarian assistance across the board.

Now, the United States also provides a great deal of assistance – humanitarian assistance – both to people in Myanmar and to refugees in the region.  And again, as I said in my opening, we’ve provided nearly $317 million in lifesaving humanitarian assistance.  We’ve also dedicated, I think as you know, hundreds of millions of dollars to advance democracy, human rights, and justice.  And I will say that much of that humanitarian assistance is implemented and delivered with the Royal Thai Government’s cooperation and support.  And so we remain, again, very grateful to the leadership role that Thailand has played in the region, including on Myanmar, and in particular most helping – helping those, rather, most in need from Myanmar.

So thanks for the opportunity to be able to highlight both Thailand’s role and America’s role in close cooperation with our Thai allies.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Well, we have so many great questions we could probably go another half hour, but I think we have to let the Assistant Secretary go soon.  So I’ll turn it back over to him for closing remarks.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  I’m happy – if you want, Katie, let’s do one more.

MODERATOR:  Okay, maybe we’ll mix it up and go to the live queue.  Christopher Woody, independent journalist based in Bangkok.  Christopher, you should be able to unmute yourself.

QUESTION:  Hi, thank you for your time this morning.  Thailand is among the U.S.’s five treaty allies in the region, but it seems like over the past three years of the administration most of the major progress on defense and security was with the other four.  I wanted to ask if after your most recent engagements in Bangkok, do you feel like the U.S.-Thai relationship is in a position to kind of pursue those – pursue that progress on defense and security that wasn’t possible previously?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, look, I’ll state very candidly and very enthusiastically that I came away from our two days of dialogues in Thailand as optimistic as I’ve ever been about the U.S.-Thai alliance, and particularly after the 2+2 dialogue I was really struck and impressed by the depth of our security relationship and our military-to-military ties.  And look, that’s been the case for more than six decades now.  But I really do think that our two militaries are closer than ever.  I think our security cooperation is probably more robust than ever.  And look, I think you could argue across the board that the U.S.-Thai alliance is as strong as it’s ever been.

But really, I was impressed by first our strategic alignment on the major issues in the region – the decades-long cooperation between our militaries; the deep and rich interpersonal relations that have developed, mainly by our operating and training together, studying in one another’s academies, and the like.  So I came away very bullish on the U.S.-Thai alliance, and again, I think you’ll see our security cooperation probably more robust than it’s ever been in the coming years.

MODERATOR:  All right.  And now, Assistant Secretary, if you have any last words you’d like to sum up, please go ahead.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY KRITENBRINK:  Well, I’ll just – I’ll thank you again, Katie, and most importantly I’ll thank our friends from the media in the region.  It’s always a pleasure to spend time together with you.  I really appreciate your questions.  I wish we had more time because I think you are right, we could probably go on for another few hours.  But I hope you’ve taken away my primary message that the United States of America remains strongly committed to the Indo-Pacific region.  It’s where we think, again, much of the history of the 21st century will be written, and where America’s future security and prosperity will largely be determined.  And in particular, I was delighted to spend so much time last week in Southeast Asia, where together with our – with the 10 countries of ASEAN we intend to ensure the most secure and prosperous future possible for our 1 billion people.

So thank you very much for spending time with me, and I’ll look forward to the next opportunity.  And thank you again, Katie.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  That brings us to the end of our time for today.  Thank you for your questions, and big thanks to Assistant Secretary Kritenbrink for joining us.  We will provide a transcript of this briefing to participating journalists as soon as it’s available, and we’d also love to hear your feedback.  You can contact us at any time at AsiaPacMedia@state.gov.  Thanks again for your participation and we hope you can join us for another briefing soon.