Challenges for ASEAN
Challenges for ASEAN
It is now clear that the decision of five Southeast Asian leaders to set up the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 1967 was a historic step. The regional grouping is a success story, respected in the eyes of the world.
Southeast Asia is not only one of the world's major reservoir of natural resources but is also an area of rapid economic growth. This region is now comparatively stable and there is steadily-improving cooperation among ASEAN's enlarged membership of Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei Darussalam and Vietnam. In the diplomatic sphere, the association also helped solve the Cambodian crisis. We observe with pride that the new government in Phnom Penh is very popular and democratic.
The ASEAN summit meeting which opens in Bangkok today is being attended by leaders from 10 Southeast Asian countries, the first such gathering in this region and one undreamt of in earlier decades. The leaders of this region will sign a declaration after their summit tomorrow. Laos and Cambodia have been observers of ASEAN while Myanmar is still watching from the outside. A representative of the Myanmarese junta will attend the summit meeting as a guest of the host country.
Myanmar will apparently remain a thorn for the region for God knows how many more years. The situation there is not better than it was last year and tomorrow does not promise improvement. The military regime in Myanmar, which is called SLORC, the acronym for State Law and Order Restoration Council, continues to violate its people's basic rights. Lately it seems to have been rougher in its handling of Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader it released in July after keeping her under house arrest without trial for six years.
Western countries have long expressed concern over the Yangon junta's heavy-handedness, but so far Myanmar's neighbors have acquiesced in the regime's dreadful human rights records.
ASEAN believes the approach it took toward the Cambodian crisis is not applicable in Myanmar's case. The organization has pursued, instead, a policy of "constructive engagement" which it says will nudge SLORC toward respecting democratic values.
But the way SLORC has treated Suu Kyi since her release has been a long way from respecting the patience and understanding shown by ASEAN to date.
Recently SLORC has decided to ban Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy from participating in future general elections and is seeking to block all opportunities for the democratic leader to lead the nation on the basis that her husband is a foreigner.
ASEAN members, which claim to respect human rights and democracy, have to decide how much longer they can stand side by side with such a regime.
This problem should be addressed soon -- not because Myanmar is that important for Southeast Asia or because it has tarnished the region's image for too long -- but because ASEAN has enough other problems to solve.
In economics, the organization has to bring forward the establishment of the ASEAN Free Trade Area to the year 2003 through steep tariff reductions on thousands of products.
As of next month, ASEAN should also schedule the removal of all non-tariff barriers. Bringing about free trade is no easy job because each of ASEAN's member-countries has a separate political will, even though each has adopted a free-market economy.