U.S. vice president seeks to reiterate rebalancing toward Asia

SINGAPORE, July 27 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden sought to reiterate the legitimacy of the U.S. rebalancing towards Asia Pacific here on Saturday.

Speaking after a tour of a facility of U.S. aircraft engine maker Pratt and Whitney in Singapore, Biden said that Asia Pacific will remain a priority with the United States as it will be important in economic terms in the coming decades.

"We are, and we will remain a resident Pacific power," he said.

He touted the comprehensive but controversial free tree pact Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) as a tool to promote competition and integration, saying that it is a key pillar of the U.S. strategy of rebalancing towards Asia.

The United States and its 11 negotiating partners, including Japan who recently joined the negotiations, will try to conclude the free trade talks within the year, Biden said.

The TPP is a pact that aims to promote greater integration across a group of countries as diverse as the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Brunei, Chile, Mexico, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. Japan recently joined the talks.

While the United States has touted it as a comprehensive free trade pact to promote further integration, the TPP has been controversial for the secrecy of its talks and concerns that it may allow the multinational corporations too much influence and thereby infringe upon the sovereign rights of nations.

Biden on Saturday urged the emerging economies to move away from protectionist policies and to integrate more deeply in the region.

The vice president also said that the U.S. economy has been able to constantly reinvent itself over the past and is now once again making a comeback from the downturn. It will continue to be the dominating power on the world stage, he said.

Biden also alleged that the territorial disputes in the region represents a threat to regional security and stability and repeated the rhetoric that the freedom of navigation should be guaranteed and that it rejects coercion and intimidation.

Biden arrived in Singapore on Thursday for a three-day visit. He held talks with Singapore leaders as well as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who visited Singapore on Friday.

Biden also visited the U.S. littoral combat ship USS Freedom, a new generation warship that has been deployed to the Straits of Malacca in a sign of the U.S. rebalancing towards Asia by increasing its military presence in the region.