Jittery Southeast Asia looks outside for help

Jittery Southeast Asia looks outside for help

By Ruth Youngblood

MANILA (DPA): Anxious Southeast Asian foreign ministers are cautiously counting on Japan's new leader to revitalize bleeding neighbors while the United States is exhorted to cough up more funds to replenish the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

But diplomats note the nine-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been painfully slow in adopting reforms such as the use of local currencies in trade and setting up a surveillance mechanism to sound an early alarm against future financial crises.

With Japanese Foreign Minister Keizo Obuchi expected in Manila to meet with his ASEAN counterparts today, Malaysian Foreign Minister Abdullah Badawi focused on expectations from outside.

"We hope they will play a more active role and will be able to help us," he said. "We know they are having problems themselves, but I think that in spite of that, the Japanese role is still very, very important if we hope to see a recovery of the ASEAN economies."

Obuchi, who has emerged as the next prime minister of Japan while the country battles its worst recession since World War II, has acknowledged he has little economic experience, leaving ASEAN dignitaries scrambling for reasons to anticipate better times ahead.

"Like any other government in our part of the world, of course the Japanese have to address themselves to the problems that are arising mostly in the financial and economic field," said Indonesian Foreign Minister Ali Alatas.

"But we are very convinced that Japan will continue to play its traditional role, its very constructive role of helping out developing countries in the region," he said.

Philippine Foreign Minister Domingo Siazon noted Japan's foreign policy will not change. "What is important is that Obuchi knows the region quite well. He has been around."

Against such vague prognoses, the delegates are turning to the United States to make more funding available to the dwindling coffers of the IMF. The ASEAN Regional Forum, which traditionally deals with security concerns, is expected to take up the financial crisis as its top priority today.

U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and ASEAN's eleven other dialogue partners are likely to hear some ardent arguments for more funds for the IMF and other institutions.

IMF-led rescue packages for Indonesia, Thailand and South Korea amounted to more than US$120 billion in the past year. Cash reserves are low, but wrangling in the U.S. House of Representatives has held up fresh funding.

Philippine President Joseph Estrada called on world economic powers to help restore financial stability in Asia by opening credit lines and providing greater market access.

"The United States and Europe, being the principal outlets of ASEAN exports, can spur our recovery," Estrada said, adding the IMF resources are "frighteningly insufficient" to prevent a further slide.

Estrada noted, however, that ASEAN must take an active part in shaping the international financial system.

The establishment of an ASEAN surveillance mechanism proposed last year is not in place yet. Both ASEAN and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) want the secretariat at the ADB's Manila headquarters for two years.

"We are still working on the precise nature of the mechanism," said ASEAN Secretary General Rodolfo Severino.

As for greater use of regional currencies, Severino said the approach would encourage trade with each other and stimulate economic activity. Only the Philippines and Malaysia have kicked the scheme off.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Laos and Myanmar (Burma).