Cambodia's entry may be left up to ASEAN leaders

Cambodia's entry may be left up to ASEAN leaders

HANOI (AFP): ASEAN members remained split on Thursday over the
timing of Cambodia's admission and may elevate the issue to their
leaders' summit next week if foreign ministers fail to reach
consensus, officials said.

A statement from Singapore circulated on the eve of the
ministers' talks on Friday confirmed that the nine-member
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) had divergent
views on when to grant membership to Cambodia.

"The issue is not whether Cambodia should be admitted into
ASEAN," a spokesman for the foreign ministry of Singapore,
current chair of ASEAN's policy-making standing committee, said
in a written reply to media queries.

"That decision had already been taken by ASEAN and there is no
change to ASEAN's position. The issue is only one of timing,
(that is) whether Cambodia should be admitted at the Hanoi
summit," the spokesman said.

"The ASEAN foreign ministers will continue their discussions
in Hanoi. If there is still no consensus, the next step would be
for the ASEAN leaders to consider the different views of the
ASEAN foreign ministers."

Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong rejected admission for
Cambodia into ASEAN before a coalition government agreement is
fully implemented in that country, the Far Eastern Economic
Review reported.

Goh's views, excerpts of which were made available in a
statement on Thursday, were among the divergent reactions among
governments to admitting Cambodia as the 10th member of the
Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) during its summit
next week in Hanoi.

"I would like to see the full sense of the coalition agreement
fully implemented before we admit them to Asean," said Goh in an
interview in the newsmagazine's latest issue.

"It's procedural. It's technical. In principle, we want
Cambodia to be a member of the ASEAN," he said.

Juanito Jarasa, assistant foreign affairs secretary of the
Philippines, said if the foreign ministers are unable to reach
any agreement, the leaders will have to make a "political
decision" about Cambodia's entry.

The leaders of Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the
Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam are holding a summit
here Dec. 15-16, followed by summits with key Asian partners
China, Japan and South Korea.

Cambodia, currently an ASEAN observer, was supposed to join
ASEAN in July 1997 but its entry was deferred after strongman Hun
Sen ousted co-premier Prince Norodom Ranariddh amid heavy
fighting in Phnom Penh.

Cambodia is now claiming its ASEAN seat after the
establishment of a new coalition between the two leaders' parties
as a result of fresh elections in July. Cambodia's UN seat,
vacant for 15 months, is to be given back to the coalition,
boosting its international legitimacy.

Summit host Vietnam is pushing hard for the admission of
Cambodia and is hosting Prime Minister Hun Sen on an official
visit just before the summit. Cambodia's King Sihanouk has also
thrown his weight behind the membership bid.

Senior ASEAN diplomats and economic officials who held a joint
consultative meeting on Thursday ahead of their foreign ministers
steered clear of the Cambodia issue and concentrated on drafting
a Hanoi declaration and an action plan on the region's economic
problems.

Nugroho Wisnumurti, head of the Indonesian delegation to the
pre-summit talks to draft a Hanoi declaration, said the focus of
the statement will be on the region's economic crisis.

"We are going to have really concrete measures to try to
address the crisis, and for recovery from the crisis," he said on
the sidelines of a joint consultative meeting of ASEAN foreign
ministry and economic officials.