On May 15, the ninth meeting of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) Joint Committee was held in Tokyo, Japan. Delegations of the 15 RCEP Participating Countries (RPCs) and the ASEAN Secretariat attended the meeting. The parties had in-depth discussions on high-quality implementation of the RCEP agreement, terms of reference (TOR) for accession working groups, development of the RCEP Supporting Unit (RSU), and other topics, and made positive progress.

At the meeting, China said that RPCs should join hands in addressing challenges and shock waves in the international economic and trade system, reaffirming confidence in regional cooperation, opposing unilateralism and protectionism, and upholding free trade and multilateralism. RPCs should implement the RCEP agreement up to high standards to leverage RCEP’s leading role in Asia-Pacific economic integration, so as to counter challenges to the international economic and trade system with the certainty of cooperation in free trade areas.

Many RPCs expressed their commitment to implementing the RCEP agreement with high quality, strengthening and deepening regional cooperation, safeguarding the free trade regime and rules-based regional trade arrangements, and jointly address uncertainties in global trade.