Philippines’ President Ferdinand Marcos Jr attends the “APEC Leaders’ Informal Dialogue with Guests” event during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Bangkok on November 18, 2022. (Photo by ATHIT PERAWONGMETHA / POOL / AFP)
BANGKOK — President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is scheduled to attend the Asean-EU Summit in Belgium in December and embark on a state visit to China in January.
On Saturday, Marcos accepted the invitation of Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc to visit Vietnam next year. The two leaders met on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) Summit here.
Speaking to reporters, Marcos said that aside from Vietnam, his fellow leaders also invited him to visit New Zealand, Saudi Arabia, Australia, France, Brunei, and Thailand.
“What countries have invited me? All. What countries will I accept? All,” he said in jest.
“So I’d like to go to them all at some point. But you know the scheduling, I have to go back to Manila and we also have a lot to fix and finish,” he added.
He said his travels abroad were “always very useful,” citing that the leaders of France and Canada attended the Apec summit here even if they came from across the globe.
“Like for example, it’s really surprising, France, Canada, these are far away [countries], but they come,” he said.
“They come because it is well recognized that the Asia-Pacific region is still going to be the driver of the global economy, which is starting already again,” he added.