President Barack Obama’s recent trip across Asia was something of a whirlwind. He went to China for an important bilateral engagement with President Xi Jinping and for the multilateral trade gathering in APEC, to Myanmar to reinforce the nascent reforms that have still not taken firm hold in the country and to highlight the continuing relevance of ASEAN, and to the G20 in Australia to underscore the importance of the Asia Pacific economies in sustaining global growth. Despite the whistlestop nature of his tour, it looks like it was worth it: having left Washington beaten down and beleaguered by the recent midterm elections and by a noticeable dip in his public standing, the president returned to the nation’s capital with concrete accomplishments in hand.
美國總統巴拉克•歐巴馬(Barack Obama)最近的亞洲之行有些來去匆匆。他訪問中國，與中國國家主席習近平簽署了一項重要雙邊協議，並參加了亞太經合組織(Apec)的多邊貿易會議；訪問緬甸，以鞏固該國還沒有穩住局面的新興改革，並強調東盟(ASEAN)依然非常重要；參加在澳洲舉行的20國集團(G20)會議，以強調亞太經濟對於支撐全球成長的重要作用。儘管此次亞洲之旅有些走馬觀花，但總統似乎不虛此行：離開華盛頓時，歐巴馬政府正因最近的期中選舉以及總統的支持率顯著下滑而倍受打擊，再次回到華盛頓時，總統兩手滿滿，帶回來了一堆實實在在的成果。