Recent developments on RTAs in North East Asia

This paper explores the recent developments for regional trade agreements (RTAs) in North East Asia since China’s accession to the WTO in 2001. After having successfully achieved high growth rates since it became a WTO member, China’s stance towards RTAs has become more positive. In particular, an RTA in North East Asia will be facilitated if China, Japan and Korea fully acknowledge the positive spillover effect from launching such an RTA. This paper further argues that all three nations have to endeavor to resolve the prolonged confrontation in their collective defense systems if they want to expedite any real progress towards a federal RTA in North East Asia.