U.S. President Barack Obama is set Tuesday to call for early enforcement of a yet-to-be-ratified Pacific free trade deal as part of efforts to advance his policy of strategic "rebalance" to Asia, an initiative widely seen as a counter to the rise of China.
Obama will make a pitch for the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact signed by 12 member nations including Japan but not China, in a speech he will deliver in Laos in what is likely to be his last trip to Asia before completing his second four-year term in January.
Obama arrived in the Laotian capital of Vientiane late Monday, making him the first sitting U.S. president to visit the landlocked Southeast Asian country. He is on a two-stop Asian tour that has also taken him to China.