Trump to visit Asia in November, attends ASEAN meet in Manila

WORLD ( Washington) :  Donald Trump will travel to  Asia for the first time since becoming president, stopping in Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines, Reuters reported. His visit, scheduled from November 3 to 14, will include attending two major summits, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Vietnam and the Association of South East Asian Nations in the Philippines. The Manila visit was earlier put on hold until it was confirmed by the White House on Friday. An Asian diplomat welcomed Trump’s decision to visit Manila because that reassures the region that Asian policy is not just about North Korea but about Southeast Asia as well.

The visit is expected to be dominated by the North Korean nuclear threat wherein the president is in increasingly bitter war of words with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un since August. The White House said Trump’s visit would “strengthen the international resolve to confront the North Korean threat and ensure the complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”