ASEAN to boost cooperation

By Oei Eng Goan

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN (JP): Foreign ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) wound up their 28th annual meeting here yesterday with a commitment to boost wider political and security cooperation with other countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

They also agreed on Indonesia as the venue for their meeting next July.

Indonesian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas said the meeting in Brunei proved that ASEAN had moved a step forward in materializing its dream of extending its membership from the current seven to 10 in the near future.

Alatas told a group of Indonesian journalists in Brunei's capital that all 10 countries in Southeast Asia have now acceded to the ASEAN Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, ensuring the association's growing role in creating cooperation and stability in the region.

"The meeting was able to finalize the legal and technical aspects of a draft treaty on a Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapons Free Zone, for when we hold the fifth summit meeting in Bangkok this coming December," Alatas said.

ASEAN, a regional economic grouping set up in 1967, currently consists of Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, which joined the group last Friday.

"The working group which comprises ASEAN senior officials have achieved marked progress in working out a nuclear free zone in the region," Alatas stated, adding that countries which formerly stifled the treaty responded well.

Indonesia

Alatas, who accompanied Brunei's Foreign Minister Mohamed Bolkiah at the closing ceremony yesterday, told participants that the 29th ASEAN ministerial meeting will take place in Indonesia, which now replaces Brunei as chair of the group's standing committee.

Indonesia has also been named as the coordinating country for dialog with the United States.

Speaking at the closing ceremony yesterday, Alatas also noted that the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), the grouping's body to discuss security in the region, has also moved forward at a pace comfortable to all participants.

The ARF, set up a year ago in Bangkok, will start meeting tomorrow with ASEAN dialog partners. The partners are the United States, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, China, Russia and the European Union.

Meanwhile, Alatas, in his capacity as ASEAN spokesman with the consultative countries, met with his counterpart from China, Qian Qichen, yesterday to discuss security issues in the region.

"What was new is that China has reiterated its stance over the Spratly Islands in front of the ASEAN members. China is willing to settle the dispute under existing international laws, including the laws of the sea of the UN convention of 1982," Alatas said.

The Spratlys are a group of islands believed to be rich in oil and gas and are currently claimed by China, Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Thailand.

Alatas said that China affirmed that it would resolve the issue through peaceful means and that it agreed to discuss the issue bilaterally with claimant ASEAN nations.

Earlier, Alatas also held talks with Vietnam's Foreign Minister Nguyen Manh Cam and Papua New Guinea's Minister of Lands and Physical Planning Albert Kipalan.