Obama's successor must build on strong US-Asia relations

US President Barack Obama is into the final leg of his eight-year term, and the leader of the world's largest economy intends to do what many of his recent predecessors did in their remaining months at the helm - get on his presidential plane and travel around the world.

Mr Obama has already stated that he is fully focused on finishing strongly on his foreign policy agenda as he prepares to vacate the White House roughly a year from now. High on his to-do list is a greater effort to accelerate America's strategic rebalance towards the Asia-Pacific region in response to a rising China. It is significant to a certain extent tha…