Officials gathered in Manila won’t let issues like the disputed South China Sea “spoil” discussions on economic matters, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Secretariat Executive Director Alan Bollard said.
"Of course we’re aware of background geopolitical issues, they’ve always been there in one form or another," Bollard said in a Bloomberg Television Philippines interview on Monday as trade and foreign ministers held talks. "The people around the table in those APEC meetings know what they’ve achieved and what we still want to achieve and we don’t want to spoil it by bringing up other issues and so we don’t."
China’s growing economic clout in the region has made it difficult for smaller economies to push back against its assertiveness in the contested South China Sea, a key waterway for trade. China has insisted the issue be kept off APEC’s agenda, even as host the Philippines said it can’t control what other leaders will raise during the meeting.