Malaysia host first East Asia Summit

Malaysia host first East Asia Summit

Jim Gomez, Associated Press/Vientiane

Southeast Asian leaders on Monday approved Malaysia's long-held
dream to hold a summit of East Asian countries, seen as an
important step toward creating a strong Asia trading bloc, but
the number of countries that would be invited was left unclear.

Overcoming initial objections of Indonesia, leaders of the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) meeting at a
summit in the Laotian capital decided to let Malaysia host the
first East Asia Summit in 2005, according to a summit statement.

A leaders' statement initially said the summit would comprise
the 10 members of ASEAN plus China, Japan and South Korea. But
hours later a revised statement was issued without any mention of
the participants.

"We agreed to hold the first EAS in Malaysia and in this
connection, tasked our foreign ministers to work out the details
concerning its modality and participation," the new statement
said.

The 13 countries -- listed in the first statement -- already
meet every year during the annual ASEAN summits, as "ASEAN plus
3." Nonetheless, former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad
had long championed an additional summit in aspirations for a
trade bloc to rival the European Union and North America.

The changes in the statement made it clear that Indonesia had
extracted some concession for relenting to allow the summit.

Indonesia had argued that the additional meeting would be
cosmetic and wasteful, and wanted any new annual summit to be
expanded to include Australia, New Zealand and India -- but that
was opposed by Malaysia, which has had uneasy relations with
Australia.

"We would not be too impressed if an East Asia summit is
simply an ASEAN plus 3 summit with a new label, an old wine in a
new bottle," Indonesian Foreign Ministry spokesman Marty
Natalegawa said.

Some ASEAN countries are concerned that their grouping would
become a junior partner to an East Asia bloc, subsumed by the
mighty economies of China, Japan and South Korea.

"We have to be careful in not diluting ASEAN but there have
been so many countries that have been so keen in having the
summit," Marty said.

"One issue is how to maintain the central role of ASEAN," Thai
Foreign Ministry spokesman Sihasak Phuangketkeow said. "We don't
know whether ASEAN is capable of leading or not."

ASEAN leaders decided to ask senior diplomats to study the
implications for the region of forming the new bloc. The study
will be submitted to ASEAN foreign ministers who will meet in the
Philippines in March.

ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Mahathir's campaign for an East Asia Summit initially drew
lukewarm responses from Japan and South Korea because of pressure
from their ally, the United States. The reluctance eroded when
the 1997 Asian financial crisis forced regional leaders to
consider new levels of cooperation.