China’s relations with the historically more remote, maritime and Muslim-majority countries Indonesia and Malaysia are complex and historically intertwined. For both Indonesia and Malaysia, China is a vital economic partner, but tensions in the South China Sea and anti-China sentiments remain prevalent. The Indo-Pacific being home to significant global trading routes is not only of strategic importance to China. Once again it has become the focus of a global contest for power.
Your host: Nico Luchsinger, Co-Executive Director, Asia Society Switzerland
Moderator: Richard Maude, Executive Director, Policy, Asia Society Australia
Speaker: Ben Bland, Director of the Southeast Asia Program, the Lowy Institute
Production: Denise Staubli, Program Officer, Asia Society Switzerland
Sources:
- Asia Society Switzerland Mini-Conference The Giant Next Door – China In Southeast Asia, The Case of Indonesia and Malaysia, November 10, 2020:
- Asia Society Switzerland Mini-Conference The Giant Next Door – China In Southeast Asia, keynote presentation by Sebastian Strangio, November 10, 2020:
- Man of Contradictions: Joko Widodo and the struggle to remake Indonesia, by Ben Bland, 2020
- In the Dragon's Shadow: Southeast Asia in the Chinese Century, by Sebastian Strangio, 2020
