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Speaker 1: Bryan Bridge, can we go into our Asia business correspondent

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Speaker 1: Peter Lewis. Peter, the China trade surplus the largest and five.

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Speaker 2: Months Yeah, hi Ryan, this is indeed it's growing. In fact,

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Speaker 2: it's on track to reach one trillion dollars with all

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Speaker 2: the countries in the world, and in fact, China runs

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Speaker 2: the trade surplus with nearly every single country in the world,

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Speaker 2: and there's up forty percent in November alone. I mean,

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Speaker 2: this is really unsustainable. It's been unsustainable for a while,

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Speaker 2: but obviously it's attracted the attention of Donald Trump, who

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Speaker 2: no doubt is ready his terriff pen for when he

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Speaker 2: gets into a power in January. He's already threatened additional

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Speaker 2: tariffs on China causes big problems for Europe. I mean,

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Speaker 2: they're being flooded with ev electric vehicle imports and their

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Speaker 2: own auto industry just can't compete with this flood of

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Speaker 2: Chinese goods. The way the trade surplace has come about

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Speaker 2: is because although exports grew, imports declined, So it means

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Speaker 2: that actually other countries around the world are struggling to

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Speaker 2: export their goods to China. And the reason why imports

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Speaker 2: have fallen in China is because a weak domestic demand.

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Speaker 2: The economy is not doing that well at the moment,

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Speaker 2: and consumers in China just don't want to go out

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Speaker 2: and spend, so as a result, there really is a

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Speaker 2: lot of sort of pent up demand, but it's not

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Speaker 2: being released now. We've just had the Chinese Economic Work Conference,

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Speaker 2: which is held every year, led by President hu Jinping,

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Speaker 2: and they've said they are going to make boosting domestic

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Speaker 2: demand their top priority for next year. But they did

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Speaker 2: say that a year ago as well, and we haven't

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Speaker 2: seen that happen, and they didn't provide any details of

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Speaker 2: what they were going to do to try and boost

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Speaker 2: domestic demand.

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Speaker 1: Interesting one of those countries that's affected by exactly what

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Speaker 1: you've just described. You know, obviously, we have a lot

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Speaker 1: of milk and dairy products that we've seen up to

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Speaker 1: China and that weaker demand has been affecting us massively.

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Speaker 1: It's going to South Korea. The president there still clinging

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Speaker 1: to office and refusing to resign, even though there's going

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Speaker 1: to be a vice to and picture.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I think he's going to be out by Saturday.

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Speaker 2: They're going to hold a second impeachment vote. The first

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Speaker 2: time around, he survived by the skin of his teeth

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Speaker 2: because the opposition parties need eight members of the People

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Speaker 2: Power Party that's the ruling conservative party to cross the

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Speaker 2: aisle and join them in voting for impeachment. Now, last time,

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Speaker 2: the leaders of his party sort of did a deal

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Speaker 2: with him whereby, in consequence of saving him from impeachment,

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Speaker 2: he would in effect hand over his powers to admit

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Speaker 2: to his cabinets and ministers and also to the party,

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Speaker 2: and they would take over a lot of his state duties.

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Speaker 2: Now there's no constitutional arrangement that allows for that, but

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Speaker 2: nevertheless it seems to be agreed whereby he would be

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Speaker 2: president in name only, but wouldn't really have any powers anyway.

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Speaker 2: On Thursday, he gave a speech where he made it

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Speaker 2: clear he wasn't prepared to do any such thing. He

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Speaker 2: said he was going to fight until the last moment.

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Speaker 2: He was blaming the decision to impose military rule on

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Speaker 2: what he called anti state forces, and he suggested that

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Speaker 2: North Korea had helped the opposition parties secure their victory

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Speaker 2: in the parliamentary elections earlier in the year. Now, the

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Speaker 2: more this is looked into, the police are investigating to

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Speaker 2: see whether there's grounds for charging him with treason. It

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Speaker 2: looks like one of the things they discovered is that

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Speaker 2: Defense Minister, when they announced this plan for martial law,

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Speaker 2: sent drones into North Korea in the hope of provoking

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Speaker 2: some sort of response from the North that would then

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Speaker 2: justify the position of martial law. So really it's quite

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Speaker 2: an extraordinary situation. But it seems almost almost impossible now

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Speaker 2: for you to survive the second impeachment vote on Saturday.

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Speaker 1: What's up with this guy behind this ego on him?

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Speaker 1: What is this?

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Speaker 2: Well he has actually yes, and you know, it's hard

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Speaker 2: to imagine what he was thinking of because he must

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Speaker 2: have known that the impeachment, the imposition of martial law

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Speaker 2: could be overturned by a vote in parliament, and that's

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Speaker 2: exactly what happened. Maybe he thought that that the military

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Speaker 2: would stop MP's getting to parliament in order to be

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Speaker 2: able to hold that vote, but in fact, the military

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Speaker 2: didn't do an awful lot to stop them, so that

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Speaker 2: that vote went ahead and it really styled his plan.

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Speaker 2: But yes, it is very difficult to imagine what an

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Speaker 2: earth was he thinking of here, because certainly the people

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Speaker 2: of South Korea are never going to accept either this

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Speaker 2: new arrangement that has come up with or the imposition

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Speaker 2: of martial law. They've got a very long, sad history

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Speaker 2: of martial law in South Korea and they certainly don't

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Speaker 2: want to go back to those days.

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Speaker 1: Certainly not right. Let's move on from South Korea. Talk

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Speaker 1: about the Taiwan military on highlard at the moment because

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Speaker 1: of Chinese warship sailing near them.

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Speaker 2: Yes, another set of exercises going on, quite a big

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Speaker 2: set of exercises this time, which involves ships of sailing

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Speaker 2: through the Taiwan Strait, surrounding the island, stimulating blockades and

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Speaker 2: so on. This time it's come because the Taiwanese President,

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Speaker 2: William Lai visited Guama and Hawaii on a stop off

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Speaker 2: to the South Pacific, and that enraged China. They really

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Speaker 2: don't like any part of America or any American state

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Speaker 2: hosting the Taiwanese president. So that's what's prompted the latest

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Speaker 2: round of maneuvers. But these are the things with these

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Speaker 2: is that they are constantly keeping Taiwan on high alert

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Speaker 2: because they have to respond. Their military has to check

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Speaker 2: out what's going on. You know, the planes that are

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Speaker 2: crossing the demarcation line, they have to spend a lot

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Speaker 2: of money and time on doing this, so it really

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Speaker 2: stretches Taiwan's military, and I think that is part of

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Speaker 2: the aim of China here to just try and see

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Speaker 2: how far it can go and and how much the

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Speaker 2: Taiwanese military is able to respond. And clearly the worry

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Speaker 2: is that one day one of these maneuvers will turn

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Speaker 2: out to be not a drill, but will actually turn

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Speaker 2: out to be the real thing, and China will go

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Speaker 2: and launch an invasion of Taiwan.

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