Last week, China, South Korea, and Japan held their first trilateral summit since 2019. Chinese Premier Li Qiang and Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida arrived in Seoul for bilateral and trilateral meetings with South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol. At the end of the trilateral summit, the three leaders announced a joint declaration that pledged cooperation on six major policy areas, including people-to-people exchange, sustainable development and economic cooperation, among others.

Before the trilateral summit, there were concerns and a relatively low expectation for successful diplomatic outcomes. With increasing geopolitical competition between the U.S. and China, security disagreements have also widened between China and U.S. allies, Japan and South Korea. On addressing key regional security issues such as North Korea’s nuclear proliferation and stability in the Taiwan Strait, the three countries have grown further apart in their security stances.

These constraints were evident in this year’s trilateral summit. Despite requests from South Korea and Japan, the joint declaration did not affirm commitment to denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. Instead, it recognized each country's respective positions on the issue. The joint statement also did not resolve other issues of disagreements, such as China’s forced return of detained North Koreans, Japan’s release of nuclear reactor wastewater into the ocean, China’s concern with the other two countries’ participation in the U.S.-led policy to limit the transfer of semiconductor technology to China.

Instead, the trilateral summit attempted to........

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