Megawati calls for ASEAN security community

Megawati calls for ASEAN security community

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

In her first public address after Tuesday's bombing in
Jakarta, President Megawati Soekarnoputri warned of the immense
threat of surging terrorism and called on countries in the region
to establish a "fully-fledged" security community.

She noted that a series of bombings, with the latest at the JW
Marriott hotel in South Jakarta, showed that the cooperation --
against the war on terror -- of the Association of Southeast
Asian Nation's (ASEAN) members was inadequate.

"Regional plans of action to tackle such problems ... suddenly
appear inadequate in the face of the cataclysms like the terror
attacks in the United States, in Bali, and a just few days ago at
the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta," she addressed diplomats at a
public lecture at the ASEAN Secretariat.

The terror attack on the JW Marriott Hotel killed 10 people
and wounded 149. Police have not named any suspect, but
speculation has fallen on Jamaah Islamiyah, which was blamed for
last year's Bali bomb attacks.

Megawati then called on ASEAN countries to adopt Indonesia's
proposal to establish an ASEAN Security Community, aimed at
addressing security issues such as terrorism and separatism.

She promised to bring the issue to the upcoming summit in Bali
in October, where she will encourage the countries to consider,
"growing into a fully-fledged security community".

"This does not mean a defense or military alliance, but a more
comprehensive political cooperation in which they share
responsibility in responding to threats to regional harmony and
security," she stressed.

The proposal for ASEAN Security Community, first unveiled at
the ASEAN foreign ministerial meeting in Phnom Penh in June, met
with a cold response from a number of skeptical members.

These countries wanted reassurances that the cooperation would
not hark back to past treaties, such as the Southeast Asian
Treaty Organization (SEATO) which split regional neighbors.

Indonesia, with the support of Thailand, nevertheless, assured
that the cooperation would not be similar to SEATO nor the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) as it would not serve as a
defense pact.

The concept was aimed to provide a mechanism to deal with
disputes, separatism and also to handle terrorism along with
other transnational crimes.

The proposed ASEAN security community would include centers
for combating terrorism, training in peacekeeping, a center for
cooperation in non-conventional issues and regular ASEAN police
and defense ministers' meetings.

But diplomats stressed that more work was needed and the
realization of an ASEAN security community would be developed
along with the cherished dream of full Southeast Asian economic
integration.

In addition to cooperation among ASEAN countries, Megawati
also called for a stronger global collaboration to fight
terrorism.

"It became clear that no single country or group of countries
could overcome this threat alone. In Indonesia's view, which is
shared by the rest of the ASEAN members, it will take a global
coalition involving all nations, societies, religions and
cultures to defeat this threat," Megawati said.

Speaking in English on the occasion of the ASEAN's 36th
anniversary, the President also cited other imminent security
problems in the region such as the North Korea Nuclear crisis,
and the stand off in Myanmar after the arrest of democratic
leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The President underlined that ASEAN should avoid unilateralism
in responding to the threats and expand cooperation on political
issues.

"ASEAN needs to do more in order to find a peaceful resolution
to these conflicts, this is especially so in the light of the
surge of unilateralism in international affairs," Megawati
remarked.