Indonesia to Join TransPacific Partnership Free Trade Zone

Indonesian President Joko Widodo, speaking after a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday, said his country intends to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal the United States has forged with 11 countries.

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Trans-Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement Deal Struck

The United States and 11 other Pacific Rim nations on Monday agreed to the largest regional trade accord in history, a potentially precedent-setting model for global commerce and worker standards that would tie together 40 percent of the world’s economy, from Canada and Chile to Japan and Australia.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership still faces months of debate in Congress and will inject a new flash point into both parties’ presidential contests.

But the accord — a product of nearly eight years of negotiations, including five days of round-the-clock sessions here — is a potentially legacy-making achievement for President Obama, and the capstone for his foreign policy “pivot” toward closer relations with fast-growing eastern Asia, after years of American preoccupation with the Middle East and North Africa.

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