China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations will send an upgraded ‘version 3.0’ free-trade agreement to their heads of government for approval in October, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Saturday after regional talks in Kuala Lumpur.
The new pact, concluded in May after 18 months of negotiations, widens the 2010 China–ASEAN Free Trade Area to cover the digital and green economies as well as supply-chain resilience, according to a statement from China’s foreign ministry.
Wang said the two sides had also endorsed a five-year action plan that sets out cooperation in more than 40 policy areas ranging from e-commerce standards to renewable-energy investment.
China and ASEAN aim to finish drafting a code of conduct for the South China Sea by next year, he added, describing the guidelines as a step towards managing overlapping territorial claims. Several ASEAN states, including the Philippines and Viet Nam, dispute Beijing’s expansive maritime claims.
Bilateral trade has expanded rapidly in recent years: two-way goods trade reached 6.99 trillion yuan (about $963 billion) in 2024, making ASEAN China’s largest trading partner and accounting for 15.9 % of its total commerce, according to Chinese customs data.
Officials did not disclose when the agreed text will be published, but diplomats said leaders are expected to endorse it at an ASEAN summit in late October. The deal would then enter a ratification process within each member state.
Analysts say the upgrade could help cushion regional supply chains against global trade tensions, though some warn that progress on the South China Sea code of conduct is likely to prove harder than finishing the trade text.
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A 17-year-old boy has been identified as the gunman responsible for the killing of Carlos Manzo, the mayor of Uruapan in Mexico’s Michoacán state, during a public event over the weekend, state prosecutors confirmed on Thursday.
Global leaders convened in the heart of the Amazon on Thursday for a high-level summit ahead of next year’s COP30 climate conference, warning that the world is running out of time to avert environmental catastrophe.
Armed pirates boarded a Malta-flagged products tanker off the coast of Somalia on Thursday, but the crew managed to secure themselves in a fortified safe room and have retained control of the vessel, according to maritime security sources.
Türkiye’s benchmark BIST 100 index ended Thursday up 0.94%, closing at 11,073.27 points. Opening the day at 11,029.29, the index gained 102.9 points compared with the previous close.
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A French court has postponed the trial of a suspect linked to the Louvre jewellery heist in a separate case, citing heavy media scrutiny and concerns about the fairness of the proceedings.
U.S. federal investigators have recovered the flight recorders from the wreckage of a UPS cargo plane that crashed and erupted in flames during takeoff in Louisville, Kentucky, killing at least 12 people and halting airport operations.
A 35-year-old man drove his car into pedestrians and cyclists on France’s Oléron island on Wednesday, injuring at least nine people in an attack that has drawn attention from national leaders.
Kazakhstan and the United States have signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in critical minerals, the Kazakh presidential press service Akorda announced on Thursday.
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has reported that Hurricane Melissa left behind almost 5 million metric tons of debris across western Jamaica when it struck the island on 28 October.
A new country is poised to join the Abraham Accords, the series of normalisation agreements with Israel, according to U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff.
The United Nations has reported that Israel has rejected 107 requests to deliver humanitarian aid materials into the Gaza Strip since the ceasefire came into effect on 10 October, preventing essential relief from reaching civilians.
A 17-year-old boy has been identified as the gunman responsible for the killing of Carlos Manzo, the mayor of Uruapan in Mexico’s Michoacán state, during a public event over the weekend, state prosecutors confirmed on Thursday.
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