Banking on a new way forward for East Asia

EAST Asia is sorely in need of good news as it tries to pull back from the brink of threatened nuclear confrontation centring on North Korea. Such good news could just possibly take the form of an agreement by the US and Japan to join the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

This is still conjecture but there have been straws in the wind lately suggesting that such a development might be in the offing. It would make sense in the context of helping resolve the standoff involving North Korea and China on the one hand and the US and Japan on the other.

For what it's worth from someone so prone to sudden changes of heart and policy, President Donald Trump has said recently that he might be willing to go easy on China over its huge trade surplus with the US if Beijing applies greater pressure on Pyongyang over nuclear weapons.