Awkward Moment for Biden as He Gets Corner Row While Xi Takes Centre Stage at Apec Summit

Lima: In an awkward moment, United States President Joe Biden was relegated to back right corner of annual family photo at Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Peru, while Chinese President Xi Jinping enjoyed a front-and-centre spot next to host country President Dina Boluarte.

five-minute awkward moment dazed Biden when he found himself taking his place in far back corner, between Thailand’s 38-year-old Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra and Vietnam President Luong Cuong. US President briefly reached for Shinawatra’s hand to stey himself.

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum wrapped up on Saturday with a spirit of detente that many fear summit may not see again for four years.

21 leers from economies bordering Pacific, including President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping, h descended on Peru for annual garing at a time when America’s President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to withdraw United States from its leership of a global free tre agenda.

Few could help noting that Biden’s late entrance on Saturday for tritional APEC family photo lent itself to a political metaphor, as rest of leers prepared to pose onstage before looking around to find Biden missing.

Chinese President Xi scored best spot in house, front and center beside host, Peruvian President Dina Boluarte.

Xi h draped himself in banner of globalization this week, inaugurating a massive $1.3 billion megaport in Peru that promises to become South America’s biggest shipping hub and using his speeches to reject protectionism.

In Xi’s summit dress, delivered by one of his ministers, Chinese leer urged APEC members to “tear down walls impeding flow of tre,” and criticized tariffs — which Trump threatens to levy on Chinese imports — as “going back in history.”

For annual photo-op, leers all wore bark-hued wool scarves from Peru — in APEC trition of posing in some garb representative of host country. While conference organizers typically position leers in alphabetical order for family photo, arrangements have varied over years.

Reporters shouted questions as Biden left stage Friday, asking how he felt about this being his last APEC summit — and one of his last major global events as president.

Biden h hoped that APEC — along with Group of 20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, where he hes Sunday — would have capped his deces-long political career with a flurry of productive diplomacy and swaggering proclamations of America’s force on world stage.

But with his party’s stinging defeat in U.S. election and future of U.S.-China rivalry uncertain, re was little he could accomplish in Lima.

Biden sought to cement alliances that could be upended by a Trump ministration. He expressed concern to leers of South Korea and Japan about what he called “dangerous and destabilizing cooperation” between North Korea and Russia.

After nearly four years of record stability in Japan-U.S. alliance — a partnership crucial for regional security — Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is now struggling to arrange a high-stakes meeting with Trump.

(Inputs from AP)