Not so pacific

摘要

Apec may stand for Asia-Pacific Econ-omic Co-operation, but the group's recent summit in Bangkok dwelt much more on security than economics. That was partly, as several participants pointed out, because a lack of security hampers economic growth. It was also, although most delegates failed to mention it, because APEC'S members are less willing to co-operate on economics than they were in the group's heyday in the early 1990s. But for the most part, responsibility for APEC'S new focus rested with North Korea, which heightened fears about its nuclear-weapons programme by lobbing at least one missile towards Japan as the summit talks got under way.