The gathering of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation trade ministers is usually a staid meeting, but this year it offered more intrigue and urgency as countries throughout the region scrambled to engage the United States in talks before a 90-day pause on punishing tariffs expires in July.
The meeting, which took place this week on South Korea’s resort island of Jeju, was the first opportunity for the group of mostly Asian economies and the United States to meet collectively since President Trump announced — and then suspended — what he called reciprocal tariffs on dozens of trading partners. The heaviest duties were applied to imports from trading partners in Asia.
The main attraction at the meeting was Jamieson Greer, the United States Trade Representative and one of the two main negotiators who reached an agreement for a temporary truce on tariffs with China last weekend. He told reporters that he could not do interviews because his schedule was jam-packed with meetings with representatives from various nations.
Cheong Inkyo, South Korea’s minister of trade, said at a news briefing that many participating countries had originally planned to send vice ministers to the meeting but then changed their minds and sent ministers to push for meetings with Mr. Greer.
David Boling, a director of Japan and Asia trade at the Eurasia group and a former U.S. trade negotiator, said most countries are eager to meet with American officials at meetings of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, or APEC, but such side discussions were even more critical this time because of the looming deadline on July 9.
“It’s all about Trump’s tariffs,” said Mr. Boling. “All those trade ministers who come in, their number one goal is to get some sort of face time with Jamieson Greer.”
Last month, Mr. Trump imposed tariffs on goods from dozens of countries that he claimed took advantage of the United States by running up trade surpluses.
A week later, after blowback in the financial markets, he suspended the tariffs for 90 days to allow time for negotiations for permanent trade deals. He kept a 10 percent “base-line” tariff on all imports.
In setting the “reciprocal” tariffs, Mr. Trump reserved some of the most punishing duties for longtime allies such as South Korea and Japan and countries in Southeast Asia like Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia, which had become manufacturing alternatives to China.
While many Asian countries have sent delegations to Washington to negotiate with the White House, Britain, one of the few countries that buys more from the United States than it sells and was not subject to the “reciprocal” tariffs, is the only trading partner that has reached an agreement with the Trump administration so far.
At a news conference on Friday, Mr. Cheong said he was able to speak with Mr. Greer about the progress that the countries have made since the start of discussions in early May. He said he explained the “Korean situation” and the challenges of holding trade talks ahead of an election on June 3.
Mr. Trump hit South Korea, a longtime U.S. ally, with a 25 percent tariff. Government officials in Seoul are trying to negotiate with the Trump administration at a delicate time in South Korean politics. Campaigning is beginning for what is expected to be a deeply divided and contentious election, necessitated by the removal last month of former President Yoon Suk Yeol, who was impeached for his short-lived attempt to place the country under martial law.
Mr. Greer also met with the vice chairman of HD Hyundai, the heavy-industry arm of South Korea’s sprawling Hyundai conglomerate, to discuss opportunities for cooperation in shipbuilding with the United States.
Both Seoul and Washington have said that Mr. Trump wants shipbuilding to be part of a new trade deal between the two countries. South Korean officials have called it a “very important” negotiating card in the discussions with the United States.
According to South Korean media reports, Mr. Greer also met with Li Chenggang, China’s trade envoy, who was part of the Chinese delegation he and U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent negotiated with last weekend.
Under the agreement, the United States agreed to reduce tariffs on Chinese imports to 30 percent from 145 percent, and China cut its levies on American goods to 10 percent from 125 percent. The reprieve is set to expire in early August.
Trade tensions between the United States and China — the world’s two largest economies and, hence, APEC’s two biggest members — loomed large over the meeting. APEC slashed its economic outlook for the region from projections made two months earlier, before Mr. Trump announced the “reciprocal” tariffs, which affect more than half of APEC’s 21 members.
The group, which accounts for around half of global trade and about 60 percent of global economic output, cut its forecast for growth to 2.6 percent from its previous projection of 3.3 percent. APEC was careful not to assign blame to any single country for the slowdown, citing “trade frictions” and “policy uncertainty.”
Carlos Kuriyama, who leads economic and trade research at APEC, said that while different governments are facilitating trade within Asia, a reduction in trade with the United States will be difficult to overcome.
“The U.S. is the largest market and the largest economy, so it represents a very significant percentage of the global economy,” said Mr. Kuriyama. “It will be hard to find a way to replace all these opportunities.”
Choe Sang-Hun contributed reporting.
Daisuke Wakabayashi is an Asia business correspondent for The Times based in Seoul, covering economic, corporate and geopolitical stories from the region.
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