China looking to boost ASEAN links at summit

China looking to boost ASEAN links at summit

BEIJING (Agencies): Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji hopes to boost
ties with Southeast Asia at a regional summit this week that is
also to include a three-way meeting with counterparts from South
Korea and Japan, the Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.

Zhu's attendance at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) summit will help an "exchange of views on how to further
promote Chinese cooperation with ASEAN countries," spokesman Sun
Yuxi said.

"China hopes to ... increase mutual understanding and trust so
as to promote common development," Sun said.

The meeting, which brings together the heads of ASEAN's 10
member governments with those of Japan, South Korea and China,
takes place in Singapore during ASEAN's annual Nov. 24-26 summit.

ASEAN is expected to take up the issue of a code of conduct to
govern disputes in the South China Sea, where several ASEAN
members and China joust over tiny islands, shoals and fishing
grounds, although an agreement is unlikely.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry official for Asian affairs,
speaking on condition of anonymity, said those ASEAN nations had
to decide the cope of a code of conduct before China would take a
stance on its adoption.

China will discuss building a rail link from Singapore to
Kunming in southwest China and shipping on the Mekong River, and
is willing to look into establishing an ASEAN-China free trade
zone to compliment ASEAN's moves toward economic integration, the
official said.

ASEAN will take the first step toward reducing internal
tariffs by 2002, and Japan has already said it would look into
the possibility of free trade with the bloc.

However, China's economy, driven by cheap labor and foreign
investment, competes more directly with Southeast Asian nations.

Meanwhile, non-governmental organizations will meet on
Indonesia's Batam island this week to highlight human rights, the
environment and other social concerns as Southeast Asian leaders
meet in nearby Singapore, organizers said on Tuesday.

Citizens' groups have long accused the 10-country Association
of Southeast Asian Nations of neglecting human rights and social
issues in its quest for economic development.

Indonesia's President Abdurrahman Wahid was scheduled to speak
Saturday at the ASEAN People's Assembly 2000 on Batam, which lies
20 kilometers (12 miles) south of Singapore.

ASEAN heads of government are holding an informal summit in
Singapore Friday and Saturday. Other high-level government
officials from the ASEAN countries begin talks in Singapore
Wednesday.

Organizers of the Batam meeting, slated for Friday through
Sunday, said they plan to draft a report on their concerns and
present it to ASEAN government leaders.

"We want ASEAN to make a stronger commitment to human rights
and democracy," said conference participant Debbie Stothard,
coordinator for the human rights group Altsean-Burma.

As an example, she cited the chaos and bloodshed that followed
East Timor's vote to secede from Indonesia last year. Australia-
led United Nations peacekeeping forces eventually stepped in.
"The governments of our region refused to even acknowledge the
problem of East Timor before," Stothard said.

"Then, when all hell broke loose last year, it was governments
outside the region that tried to resolve it," she said.

To be more effective, ASEAN would have to change its central
tenant of noninvolvement in individual members' domestic
politics, she said.

The ASEAN People's Assembly 2000, organized by Indonesia's
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and the
Singapore Institute of International Affairs, it brings together
over 300 representatives from various walks of life from all 10
ASEAN members along with non-ASEAN observers.

ASEAN, an economic and security alliance formed more than
three decades ago, groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos,
Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and
Myanmar, which is also known as Burma.