 Okay, I think we're ready to start. Thank you everyone for being here and let's get started, apologies for the slight delay. The Chinese Premier Li Keqiang yesterday said something to the effect that as part of structural reforms you need to reduce the number of approvals that you need to get to get things done. And I was wondering whether in the international arena we're going in the opposite direction, some sort of reverse structural reforms. And that's really the subject of the debate today. The question is, will intensified geo-economic competition derail economic growth and impair the steady march of integration that we've seen for many years prior. Particularly when you look at it from the perspective of business, trade, supply chains, capital flows, investments, or is it completely a flash in the pan? Is it a blip? Is it just noise that will not have any material impact on either globalization or economic growth? So that's the subject of our debate today. And before I come to my distinguished panel here, I would like to invite the distinguished audience, members of the audience around this arena, to please vote your position on this motion using your smartphones. That's the URL, wef.ch, slash vote, I'm told it's very easy, if you wouldn't mind taking a moment to hit agree or disagree, please. So what I'm hoping for is that this will give us a starting point for the baseline, the starting point for the needle that we start the debate with, and we'll see whether it moves, how far it moves at the end of the debate again. I should also say that during the entire course of the debate, if you'd like to participate, send in your comments, and this applies to people that may not be here in the room as well, you can tweet your comments. The hashtag is hashtag equal growth and it'll appear in the iPad that I have here. And if I can, I'll try and bring some of those comments in as well. And of course during Q&A I'd very much appreciate active, aggressive participation from all of you here. OK, Donald, should we take a look at the results, please? OK, 60% agree, 40% disagree, and I should say that the online poll that we had before the start of the session, it was pretty much, it's pretty much consistent with this. It's about two-thirds agree and a third disagree. So let's dive straight into it. Let me introduce my panel, please. I'll start with Mr. Pasquale Lamy. Pasquale Lamy is honorary president, not Europe, Jacques Delors Institute in France, former European Trade Commissioner and Director-General of the World Trade Organization, WTO. To my right is Dr. Lee. Dr. Lee Darqueer is professor of finance at Tsinghua University and formerly member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the People's Bank of China. Annabel Gonzalez. Annabel is senior director for trade and competitiveness at the World Bank, previously minister of trade in Costa Rica. And Kirill Dimitrov. Kirill is chief executive officer of the Russia Direct Investment Fund, formerly with Goldman Sacks and McKinsey. Ladies and gentlemen, a round of applause for my panel, please. OK, so my first question, Mr. Lamy, I would like to start with you, sir. If you wouldn't mind giving us your position on the debate and whether we should really be worried. Yeah, I've been, like you, assigned on the side of the yes side, i.e. there is a strong risk that geopolitical and geo-economic competition derails the present course of globalization in terms of integration and growth. Now, I think the starting point is pretty clear. There is a growing discrepancy, sometimes on the verge of rupture, between economic integration on the one side and political integration on the other side. And this is a very risky zone, as one big philosopher in the 20th century was called Karl Polanyi, showed when he analyzed the reasons that led to the Second World War. His basic point was that the fundamental reason was what he called a disembedding of economy on the one side and society on the other side. Now I think this is something that might happen. Why? Basically because these two beds, these two clusters, are run differently. At the end of the day, the big aggregating factor in integration, in globalization, is technology, market capitalism, markets which in many ways are rational. It's the domain of reason. Of course entrepreneurs have to use passion and the relationship they have with the consumer sometimes is about passion, but the system as a whole works with the law of reason. Now politics on the other side works with the laws of passion. Politics is about mobilizing people on your side, whatever argument you can find to put them on your side, and we know by experience that irrational pitches are in politics sometimes much more efficient than rational pitches. So that's in my view the root of the problem. This is why we are entering a very dangerous zone. We still have old issues of the previous centuries which have to do with territorial ambitions, disputes, wars, what's happening between Russia and USEU on one side, for instance, is a clear resurgence of 17th, 18th, 19th century classical conflicts. There is a bit of that brewing in the China Sea, although both Japan and China have been let's say behaving as responsible Westphalian animals so far. So we have this set of issues. But on top of that, we now have a political mobilization under the form of populism, which is based on identity, preservation or promotion, and where lots of populist movements on this planet are mobilizing proximity against distance. And in an era of globalization, mobilizing proximity against distance can be politically extremely efficient. It's us and them, which is a good old story of how to divide politics. If you take the relationship this has with the economic side, it's no coincidence in my view that populist movements, whether in Europe, in US, in India, you'll tell us about China. I'm not quite sure how I would define populism in China, but I'm sure there's a bit of that down there, Indonesia, South Africa, Brazil. It's no coincidence that whether on the right or on the left, all these populist movements are protectionist. That's a fact. And this is where I see the red zone, and I think we've already stepped into that. Now, if there is a solution to that, intellectually there are two possible solutions. Number one is slow globalization, which is what some are advocating. Number two is adopt some sort of charter of how to responsibly wrong globalization in a responsible way, which has to do with morals, with ethics, which is a bit more than what exists in the international system. Now, the first avenue in my view doesn't make sense. It will not happen. The reason that have pushed globalization to its present stage will keep pushing globalization further in the future, and the main reason being technology. So that won't happen, and the time humanity adopts a sort of new UN charter with a sort of serious moral compass that will align ethics so that populistic forces bump into a sort of ethics wall. That's in my view far away, which is why I'm quite pessimistic. I see. Would you say this? I had to be pessimistic. Thank you for making the case. Would you say this rupture, this dissonance between the political forces and the economic forces, the divergence between the two? Has that just crept up on us unexpected? Is it because people have given up on growth, and so they're just looking at how to cut the pie amongst themselves? What happened? All right. There's a bit of that short term. It's obvious that given what you have to redistribute in some systems for collective welfare, the lower the growth, the more the debate on how to share the little you create is tough. That's true. But that's not the fundamental problem. There is a sort of dialectic between the force, the speed of globalization, and the mobilization of identity. There are strong elements of unity, again, economic integration, market capitalism, finance, technology, but there are also strong elements of social fragmentation. And one of the reasons for that is that, as we all know, globalization is incredibly efficient, but it is, so far, socially also incredibly unjust. And we've known that, including recently, where this whole debate on what you do with the concentration of wealth, what about the middle class in further globalization with the impact of technology on the sort of middle range of job classification? So these two phenomenons, in a way, feed each other. Right. Thank you. Carol, if I may come to you, I would have thought, given that you are certainly from a geopolitical sense in the eye of this storm, or eye of a storm, you would be very concerned about the world. Is that not the case? Well, actually, I'm moderately optimistic that the forces of wisdom and integration will prevail, but I do agree that geopolitical fight intensified dramatically in the last couple of years. And frankly, I'd like to divide, you know, this geopolitical competition into two parts, the healthy one and then healthy one. And the healthy one is, for example, is technology. So when somebody is competing for resources, for being efficient with other countries and advances technology, it's healthy competition, because at the end of the day, it makes the country stronger, but also fosters integration. And the unhealthy one is the one where you actually try to weaken other countries. And sometimes some people try to do it by actually setting a regional conflict that weakens the whole region. So we find this unhealthy competition unhealthy. And we find the... How would you characterize the current situation? So I believe it's currently very unhealthy. And I think lots of new tools of economic warfare emerged. And we can talk about economic and media warfare, which is sort of a new reality of using ideology, media, combined sanctions to affect pressure. But still, why do I believe that despite all of those tools of economic warfare will be OK? First of all, you know, every action gets counteraction. And when people try to use payment systems, rating agencies, you know, other methods, sort of alternative emerge. And we see, for example, in many other countries, they develop their own payment systems, they develop their own rating agencies. And frankly, I think people are very much aware of this economic warfare tool chest that some people have, and they want to move away from those systems. The second point is we see a significant and rising cost of that kind of behavior. So I'm very surprised that people don't talk much about Iraq or Libya. But I think it's very clear that once you, you know, do some actions, and as a result, there is a regional conflict, the costs of this are tremendous. So frankly, it's almost like a surgeon who keeps on operating, gets things wrong, but doesn't lose license and continues to do surgery. And we need to recognize those costs because, for example, some people are excited, Russia is having an economic crisis. Well, actually one of the top hedge funds gave us this number, that if Russia has a major crisis, Europe will lose 300 billion dollars. So let's talk about this cost, this real cost of sort of economic fighting, which is quite significant. And I almost feel we need the world anti-monopoly committee. Because just in economy, when you have a monopoly, it's bad for consumers. When you have some people try to assert geopolitical economy, it's bad for countries, the cost is very significant. And the third reason I'm quite optimistic is that actually for growth, basically politicians, business people, employees, people, they need growth. And for growth, really integration and communication is the only way. So that's why G20 is operational, that's why BRICS is happening, that's why lots of unions are happening to promote that. We ourselves cooperate quite a bit with other sovereign wealth funds, and we created a big partnership with sovereign wealth funds. And we find it quite a good model. So to conclude, we believe that geopolitical competition is impossible to stop. It's almost a Darwinian process that will happen going forward. But we really need to promote healthy ways of geopolitical competition. And really ask the right questions. And the right questions are when we are facing need to fight cancer, when we are facing need to do lots of great things. Why are we so divided at this point in society and in different countries? And for example, if you are so concerned about Ukraine, should you be asking the right question, which is, how do you pay $20, $30 billion? And who pays it to actually make Ukraine a stable economy? Very few people asking this question. Kill, the bit I don't get is your moderately optimistic position here. You seem to be very pessimistic. And I generally believe that we'll go through this part of the cycle. That frankly, the challenges for us are so significant that only by forward-looking approaches, by something that we just discussed here in Davos, by understanding the real cost of negativity will be positive and optimistic. That makes sense to me. It doesn't have to be destiny, I guess is what you're saying. People can get together and solve that. If I could just ask you specifically about sovereign wealth funds. Would you say that sovereign wealth funds are a force for stability in a pool of funds non-mark to market that can potentially be a source of patient capital, infrastructure investments and so on? Or are the engines of, or perceived engines of economic statecraft, which in a low trust environment doesn't help? How would you? Well, all the key sovereign wealth funds they sign Santiago principles, which basically they abide to be pure economic agents. And that's very important because they have long-term capital, they can go through ups and downs of crisis. So we believe that sovereign wealth funds are incredibly positive force. And Arab sovereign wealth funds is a good example. When oil price was high, trillions of dollars went into those funds that now provide good stability for the region. So we frankly believe that sovereign wealth funds is a good force for good and cooperation between sovereign wealth funds is important for future growth. Thank you. Professor Lee, why should we be worried? Well, coming from China, I follow the tradition of Confucius, that is to always respect and follow the senior and the wise guys. Here we have Mr. Lamin, well, I'm joking. Despite his being here, I still argue that geopolitical competition derails economic integration. Why? Because economic integration requires concrete things, requires business to business investment, and the business to business deals. Requires to people to people deals like tourism, like consumption, like importing goods, consuming other countries products. And also requires government to government agreements to lower the barrier of trade than Mr. Lamin's whole career. As part of it, it's devoted to this government deals. And today, in our world of intensified geopolitical competition, we see all three areas, things are slowing down. Take the example of the China-Japan dispute in South China Sea. By the way, the Japanese side, even today, the government, refuses to recognize there's a dispute. This sounds very strange, right? There's a dispute, and they say there's no dispute. We are the owner of the islands. Whatever, it sounds very ridiculous. That's why I follow, I fully respect Mr. Lamin. Politics is irrational, it's passionate. Anyway, so what's the consequence of the South China? We have some Japanese members in the audience who are able to bring them in. Well, here are your views, right? I was only stating a fact. I'm not making any points, right? We'll come back to you, sir. We can come back, we can come back. We can come back. At least the government of Japan's statement, I can quote them, right? Anyway, what's the consequence? The consequence is that Japanese goods should be doing well in China. Take the example of Japanese cars. Japanese cars are actually wonderful products for the habits of Chinese consumers, right? But unfortunately, for the past two years, Japanese cars are not doing nearly as well as imported cars from Germany and other parts of the world, right? Because people-to-people exchange, the feelings are not normal, right? And take the example of the Russian. The Russian-Ukrain dispute. When you ask a dispute, do you agree with this dispute? Maybe you say no dispute. Anyway, it doesn't matter. It's an internal Ukrainian matter. OK, internal Ukrainian matter, right? It's a matter. It's a matter. I just love the fact that you're looking to have a dispute with everybody around. That's right. It's wonderful. I'm just trying to recognize the facts. So the Russian, with a consequence of the dispute, the Russian economy is not doing well, right? The projection is that it will contract 5%. Another 5% this year on top of last year's contraction. And then now Russia is speeding up its negotiation with China in building oil pipes and gas pipes. Well, this may be wonderful for the Chinese interest. However, from a global interest point of view, this may not be. Why? Because part of Russia is close to Europe. Russia should have done projects with Eastern Europe, with other parts of the world. Rather, Russia is looking to China to look for deals. So this is locally beneficial. However, globally it's not beneficial. So overall, I would argue that geopolitical competition is not good for global integration and growth. Thank you for that, Professor Li. Annabelle, if I may come to you now. We just had a very active demonstration of why we should be worried. I don't know if this was staged or not, but you proved the point very well. Why are you optimistic? Well, I think that geoeconomic competition as a factor derailing economic integration and growth is highly overrated. I think that in the first place, trade integration, economic growth, are not controlled by the state, except at the margins. And we may come to this. Second, other factors are more important. The private sector, multinational enterprises in particular, drive global trade and investment close. Statistics, for instance, from UNCTED, say that 80% of the world trade today is organized around international production networks. So I think that this is a very strong force in favor of growth economic integration. Second, and it has been mentioned here before, technology is also a key driver of a trade of integration of growth. Technology, for example, enabled global value change by lowering transportation costs and enhancing communications. It can also have an impact on trade, for instance, and we will see that in the years to come with 3D printing, for example, or robotics and others. And institutions are also an important factor underpinning trade and economic growth. And in particular, I think that the WTO and its agreements have played a very important role and play a very important role in providing a framework that will permit trade and investment to flow and economic growth to happen. Just recently, for example, the WTO ruled that some restrictions that China had placed on rare heirs, for example, that was a very controversial matter, were contrary to the WTO. And China has expressed that it will eliminate those restrictions. So private sector technology institutions are very important factors influencing global growth. Now, geoeconomic competition cannot either deliver meaningful agreements. Geoeconomic competition may play a role in deciding to start a negotiation of an agreement, but it is not enough to conclude the agreement. Normally, there are very strong domestic forces within a country that oppose meaningful agreements. So for them to be able to be realized, you need to have strong economic and commercial underpinnings. And finally, I would like to say that the evidence on where geopolitical competition is taking us as regards integration is not totally clear or is mixed, if you wish. If you look at negotiations of the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the Trans-Statex Trade and Investment Partnership or the Regional Cooperation Economic Partnership by different parts of the world, you may think that they're going in one direction. But on the other hand, you also have that China and the US are negotiating a bilateral investment agreement, the EU and China as well. Maybe soon we will have negotiations between India and the US again on investment. Then there are bilateral negotiations in the US where, for instance, China is participating or interested in participating as well. So to me, the signals are rather mixed. So I wouldn't go all the way to say that geopolitical competition is actually derailing economic integration. Thank you for that. I can relate to the argument you make that there are other factors that may be further up the hierarchy. I read a report here in Davos just a couple of days ago that suggests that underinvestment in global infrastructure globally is probably the number one headwind against global growth. If I may come to you, sir, one more time. Particularly if you could cast your mind back to the WTO days. And both of you have worked there before you, of course, as Director-General. Were those the good old days? And is this the new context where everyone's fighting? Or do we have a roast into view of how good it used to be and how bad it is right now? In order to answer this question, I'm afraid I have to change camp. OK. The powers argument. You should change the sit-down. I'm afraid I have to change camp because, A, I very much agree with what Annabel said, which is that what the factors, the shaping factors of economic globalization and integration are there. They are stable. They will keep integrating. That institutions, some institutions may play a role in this. And I would very much agree that, I mean, among other international organizations, the WTO has a sort of specific efficiency coefficient. It works better on the purpose it has, which is reducing obstacles to trade than other organizations who have other purposes but in the same global level. And I totally disagree with this notion that because there are bilateral deals going here and there, the multilateral system is in chambers. That doesn't, I mean, it doesn't work. What matters at the end of the day in this trade field is whether trade obstacles are growing or shrinking. And the reality is that trade obstacles are shrinking. There are skirmishes, you know, there. Now, where I would retake my camp answering to Annabel, what Annabel says, it looks fine. It works without governments. It's business, it's finance, it's technology. Don't bother these governments who are in the realm of fashion. Well, governments matter, Annabel. And governments have to be sustained by a sort of legitimization process. They need a stock of legitimacy to remain in place, whether in democratic systems or in other systems where legitimization is taking a different shape. And in order to keep this legitimization base, in many cases, they need to mobilize passion. And we are in a world where there is a lot of passion available, notably, and I'm not saying this because I'm French, on religious grounds. The world of today is a world where religious antagonisms are stronger than they were 50 years ago. Well, that's not a good sign. Well, I'm very glad you came back to your line of arguments, and I think for Professor Lee, it's going to pose a problem because the Confucian's values, if you're going to follow him, I don't know how that's going to work out. But if I could, you mentioned China and the Rare Earth incident. A more recent one is what you might characterize as economic nationalism under the guise of cybersecurity. So I want my own ATM machines. I want my own Windows operating system because I may not trust the foreign ones. Do you think that is taking hold? This pullback, protectionism under the guise of cybersecurity? Well, first of all, wearing doubles. So we have to follow the internationally accepted principles. So I'm not always blindly following the senior and vice people, right? I've sent out my own judgments, right? OK, come back to your point, whether they are economic nationalism under the cybersecurity stuff. I think there's some truth to it. There's some truth to it because behind all these policies, they are real economic interests, right? They are real investments done by local people who try to get better benefit by excluding imports from other countries. But that being said, let me still strongly argue that they are real cases. They are real cases in which the cyber technology, the internet technology, is used by some countries or some groups of people to exploit other groups of people. So there are lots of evidence of that. And again, it's dispute. No one knows what really happens. But we know for sure lots of this is very, very dirty parts of the world, right? So in this regard, I do argue that because of geopolitical competition, right? Internet, unfortunately, is utilized as a weapon to attack other groups, other camps. So therefore, this slows down the necessary integration of the economy. And you wanted to come in. I'll come to you. Yes, I want to take a couple of the points that Pascal was making to say that I certainly recognized the role of governments. I was a minister myself, so I need to support the idea that governments are relevant. Now, I think that the question is, I think you're right in saying that governments need to have legitimacy and that sometimes they use populist measures to find that legitimacy. But I would also argue that governments cannot go against economic rationale for too long a time. There are a few exceptions, certainly in the world, but there are very few. Because governments that do that will not remain in power for long. I say I recognize there are a couple of exceptions out there. Do I ask for names? No, no, not necessarily. And the third point is that we have been discussing here, I think, different things. Because we've been discussing geopolitical competition and then other factors, for instance, such as religion. And I do think that all these factors may come to play. And at some point, they may come together into a melange that is not very good for the world. But what I would argue is that these other forces that I mentioned are a much more stabilizing factor, again, in most cases. And that history has shown that to be the case as well. Carol, if you just look at it from a business point of view, there is very low visibility on how state actors may or may not act in a coordinated manner. Regulatory authorities are not working in a coordinated manner. How can it not derail growth? Well, I think as the force to address key issues for the world is a very important one. And what we see is, for example, technology example. You mentioned the computers that nationalism will take. I think what happens is for society is they want to use economic punishment tools. They will suffer. Because if you can buy a computer from that nation and you know if you misbehave in the opinion it explodes, then you'll buy it from a nation that doesn't use tool of economic influence and aggression. So I think we are a big believer that for the world growth to happen, something that Pascal mentioned before is really critical, which is WTO kind of cooperation on trade, similar kind of cooperation on investment. And that is the force that will be more powerful than isolationist economic ways to affect situations that over the long term will not really work. And the final point is I believe actual terrorism is a byproduct of unhealthy geopolitical competition. Because maybe if you look at the roots of terrorism and why it exploded so recently in the recent terms, then you start thinking about why it happened and what's your geopolitical competition place there. Animal, if I think about the Gordon Brown G8 meeting 2009 that was supposed to be the one that led to a coordinated response to the global financial crisis. Well, firstly, we don't have a G8 anymore. But emblematically, that sort of cohesion, is it gone for good? Well, I think that we are in the process of transformation, if you wish, of the international economic and political order. And we see signals of that every day. If you come to think about the participation of developing countries, for instance, in global trade and investment flows, it's quite significant that today the amount of trade coming from developing countries trade is about 50% of global trade. Investment flows are about a quarter of investment flows originating developing countries. So we are indeed seeing a very important transformation. And I think that to me, it's a question of more, what is the dynamic that we are going to follow to reach a stability-induced new order? Is it going to be sort of negotiated top down, as it was previously? Or is it going to come through different combinations of agreements and integration mechanisms that eventually may come together? So I think that this is the question that we have before us. But there is no question to me that we are indeed moving towards a new normal, if you wish. If I may on this one, I think the example of the G8 versus the G20 is an interesting one. The G8 started with a G5, which were pure economics. During that period, let's say, it started in 1974, 35 years, it moved slowly into geopolitics. A large part of the G8 discussions, and I was a G8 sheriff for a long time, were geopolitical issues. So in a way, it was a time where this integration was still there. Now, take the G20. The G20 can only discuss economics. It's no coincidence that even things which are in between geoeconomics and geopolitics like environment, for instance, have been totally evacuated from the G20 table because the disagreements were too large. So that's a strong argument to show that this integration of the past is now in bachet. I'm looking for arguments, a few arguments. That's a very good one. That's a good one. Let me turn to the audience now, if I may, to see if we have questions from people in the room who'd like to start with the first question. Nanatole? OK, if you want to take a few more minutes to think, I will ask my next question to Professor Lee. When China and the BRICS, they set up their own bank, the investment bank, the infrastructure bank, is this a new world order in the sense that it's a competing ideology versus what we have right now, or do they just want their own version of the IMF and their own version of ADB? And so there's really no clash of ideology in the geopolitical sense, but it's just I want my own. Neither, neither. I think all the infrastructure, institutional infrastructure being proposed last year within the BRIC countries actually are efforts to gradually and constructively push evolution, the evolution of the existing global economic governance. So take the example of the BRIC investment bank. The BRIC investment bank actually operates to cooperate with existing institutions, like the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank. And the working language most likely will be English. And the voting rights mostly will be equally shared among the member countries. And so the BRIC investment bank is not meant to compete with the World Bank, rather to augment the size and the impact of the World Bank. I see. If I could now just, if we have a microphone, please, give it to Mr. Hasagawa from Dakeda, Japan. Audience is expecting me to raise the territorial iron dispute issue, but I'm not going to raise that. That's another story. But since government leaders and the World Organization leaders are here, I'd like to ask about the free trade agreement. We are now focusing on concluding the TPP Trans-Pacific Partnership amongst the 12 nations. But the United States and Japan are leading this discussion. And hopefully within a few months, in this year we will be able to reach a conclusion, at least bilaterally between the United States and Japan. Both countries are producing more than 80% of the terminations congregated total. So we are the leading position. But at the same time, we are in parallel from Japan's viewpoint pursuing free trade agreement U and also RCEP, regional comprehensive economic partnership in major Southeast Asian countries. And also bilateral with Australia was just concluded. But unfortunately, his former leadership organization WTO just didn't work to put this together. There are so many different reasons existed. But what do you guys think about this type of the regional or geopolitical group free trade discussions and agreement? Thank you, Esegawa-san. If you want to just hold on to that question, I'd like to pass the microphone to Sir John Soros, please. Thanks very much. And I was one of those who voted no to the question because I thought it was, whilst there's no doubt that geo-economic competition does do some damage to international growth, the chance of it derailing economic growth on its own, I think, are limited. And that's the current disputes or disputes that Mr. Dimitrov was talking about. They do cause damage to the European economy. But it's not going to derail. There are other things, other bigger derailers than that. But the one I'm most concerned about is the US-China relationship, where there isn't a threat at the moment of geo-economic competition, correct me if I'm wrong. I'm just interested in Professor Lee's thoughts in particular about how the economic dimension of the US China relationship can be taken forward to entrench what will be the most important single political relationship in the 21st century to avoid it becoming the sort of geo-economic rivalry that could both destabilize the large parts of the world or, and at the same time, have a really serious impact on economic growth. Professor Lee. Wonderful question. This actually gave me a chance to illustrate my proposition. US-China relationship, I think on both sides, especially with the new leaders coming in on the Chinese side, governments recognize that this political relationship is extremely important, is most important for China and perhaps for the US. So leaders on both sides, also elites on both sides recognize that this relationship is more important than pure economic and trade. So on the Chinese side, there's wide recognition that China should do number one job. Number one thing in its diplomacy is to maintain a working and good relationship with the US. Even though China and Japan are not enjoying the best relationship, but China works very hard to maintain the relationship with the US. And so to put it in the simple language, China said the US is still the boss, number one. China is not going to challenge the US supremacy, not in the near future, perhaps never. Starting from this, all economic deals can be relatively easily resolved. So it's not the other way around. It's not the economics working for the political relation. It's the political relation changing or anchoring the economic relationship. Mr. Lemme, so would you like to respond to Mr. Hussain? I'll, of course, respond. But on this one, I'm certain that that's what you wish to happen. I'm not certain that this is what will happen. For one reason, which is a simple one, which is back to this economics versus politics. If I'm the US president, I will need a lot of energy to convince Congress to sign something that has to do with trade with China. Why? Because lobbies will be affected by this. We'll use an anti-Chinese narrative in the US public opinion, which is available. Now, same on the Chinese side. Let's assume these discussions take place within the Politburo. If I want to oppose a measure that the majority of the political things is good for China, I would say you're caving in to the US. And this has a lot of resonance in Chinese public opinion. So again, that's what you wish. And then there are the political realities. And it sometimes may be different, which in a way, which is why we need clever politicians. Otherwise, there wouldn't be of much use. Now, on opening trade, on this, I'm extremely pragmatic. I'm with a Chinese proverb. Don't mind the color of the cat provided it catches mice. Now, whether the cat is multilateral, regional, bilateral, plurilateral, what matters is whether trade is more open or not. Now, trade is more open than it was five years ago. It was more open than it was 10 years ago, which is, by the way, where you have to judge the record of the WTO, not by the scenery of negotiations, which are a big theater where, again, domestic constituency should play a big role. What matters is that all these processes taken together synergize in eliminating progressively obstacles to trade, which change with time. This is what will happen with TPP, which won't be a great thing, but it will be done. Now, the arbitration between substance and speed, which is always a big problem in trade negotiations, has reached the state of majority with TPP. I think the partners in the Trans-Pacific Negotiation now all agree that they spent enough time and that just get what's in there. It's not much, by the way, but let's get it done. This is how things move. Thank you. We just have a few minutes left if I could ask Kirill for your comments, and then Hannibal, and then you first. I think a very fascinating question, and I think a very interesting discussion here. I think whenever we have a world, and what just was discussed, the US is so possessive of its number one role in the world that it expects other countries to sort of treat it as a boss, and whenever somebody gets strong enough, it may retaliate effects or partnerships. And do we want a world where that is an ever-going reality going forward? I think my reality is that China will get stronger, and it would not want to do what you mentioned, to treat US as a boss who needs to be dealt with as a boss. And I think we generally need to move to a world where leading nations do not try to be so possessive of number one place, but recognize that only by being more humble will the world be a better place. If we go back to our question, will geoeconomic competition derail economic growth and integration? I continue to say that, no, it may be a factor that may impact it, but other factors again will tend to stabilize this. So I think that we are in a good position. Firstly, 30 seconds. Very quick, two top priorities of Chinese leaders, whoever they are right now at 20 years. Number one, make sure making peaceful relationship with the rest of the world. Main thing, the US. Second, make sure the economy continues to grow. And currently, and from now on, the economy is no longer as dependent on trade as it used to be. Trade as a share of GDP is coming down. That's why I maintain my point that maintaining good relationship with the USA, regardless of trade, is most important. Okay, we've come to the end of our time for the debate, it's time to look at the results to see if the collective opinion of people in the room has changed or not. So you know the motion, geoeconomic competition derails economic growth and integration. Agree or disagree? Please vote one more time. You're not voting, sir. You can tell me or no, disagree, okay. Okay, Donald, should we see the result, please? Uh-huh. It was 2%. We did. We have a 2% of the votes. The needle did move. If we had more time, it would have been better. And Mr. Hasegawa had used the voting pad, would have gone even a little bit more towards an even split. So it looks like we're... And also, people kept on shifting their positions, which to me suggests that there's still hope that there is hope for conversions. It doesn't have to be polarized. I just want to thank the panel, particularly because you were very supportive and took polarized positions on a topic that is highly nuanced and obviously reality is always somewhere in the middle. So thank you very much and thank you obviously to the audience as well.