Japan sould take the lead to ensure regional stability

Japan sould take the lead to ensure regional stability

The Daily Yomiuri, Asia News Network, Tokyo

Japan has maintained close relations with the founding members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Singapore.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi is scheduled to leave for a weeklong tour of the five ASEAN nations.

The international political landscape has been undergoing great changes since the terrorist attack on the United States on Sept. 11, as shown by a newly formed antiterrorism alliance among three military powers -- the United States, Russia and China.

In this sense, it is a critically important task for Japan to shore up its relationship with Southeast Asian nations in mapping out a diplomatic strategy. The significance of Koizumi's ASEAN tour lies in this.

Japan should take the lead in working to ensure regional peace and prosperity as an Asian leader. To accomplish this goal, this country must further increase its cooperative ties with the ASEAN countries in security, economic and other areas, while also basing its diplomatic strategy on its alliance with the United States.

The prime minister's itinerary includes separate talks with the leaders of the five nations. On Monday, Koizumi is also scheduled to deliver a speech about Japan's diplomatic policy toward other Asian countries.

During these meetings, the prime minister will call for efforts to step up relations between Japan and the ASEAN nations, largely by listing three goals -- reforms and prosperity, cooperation in ensuring stability and coordinated efforts to build a better future in the region.

To accomplish reforms and prosperity, Koizumi will ask the five ASEAN countries to back Japan's structural reform campaign and in turn will pledge to support their reform efforts. To promote cooperation in ensuring regional stability, the prime minister will promise to aid the ASEAN nations in their efforts to resolve the host of problems afflicting them, including ethnic conflicts, movements of refugees, drug trafficking and infectious diseases.

Koizumi is also scheduled to tell the ASEAN leaders that Japan will support their struggle to better educate their peoples and develop human resources, with the aim of jointly working to build a better future in the region.

His planned address on Japan's diplomatic policy toward ASEAN will stress the importance of building mutual trust among nations in this region. Koizumi also hopes to emphasize the need to establish a new cooperative relationship among these countries on the basis of the Fukuda Doctrine, a set of guiding principles laid down in 1977 by then Prime Minister Takeo Fukuda in Manila concerning Japan's diplomatic policy toward other Asian nations. Economic recovery a sine qua non

We hope that Koizumi's speech will set forth a constructive and well-founded blueprint for Japan's new partnership with the ASEAN nations.

Among other things, the prime minister should reiterate his determination to bring his country's economy back on the road to recovery to promote reforms and achieve prosperity in the region. Japan -- a nation whose economy is coming close to a deflationary spiral -- could threaten the world economy. This is particularly significant in that the global economy is increasingly weakening in the wake of Sept. 11.

The prime minister should tell the ASEAN leaders what his administration will do to end the recession as soon as possible and put the economy back on track, a move that would serve to revitalize the Asian economy as a whole. This will be essential to put to rest concerns held by the ASEAN nations about the Japanese economy.

China will be an invisible but prominent guest in Japan's upcoming talks with the ASEAN countries. It is a matter of prime importance for both Japan and ASEAN to think about what kind of relationship they should build with China, a nation that has emerged as a new power in Asia on the strength of its rapid economic growth.

While they are watching its vast market with keen interest, the ASEAN countries remain wary about China. This gives Japan good reason to play a key role in determining what kind of relationship Japan and the ASEAN nations should establish with China.

Given all this, it is important for the prime minister to tell the ASEAN leaders that Japan is prepared to form new ties with their nations that could include an accord on comprehensive economic partnership with ASEAN as a whole, beginning with a free trade agreement to be signed with Singapore soon.