New partners join ASEAN talks

New partners join ASEAN talks

JAKARTA (AFP): China, India and Russia sought closer ties with ASEAN as they joined a wide-ranging dialogue with the trade- driven southeast Asian grouping yesterday.

The three countries take to 10 the number of full dialogue partners of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which engage in annual talks on an array of political, security and economic issues.

Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeni Primakov said Moscow planned to set up special economic zones in Siberia and the far east of the country to boost development and promote ties between the two regions and the Asia-Pacific.

Addressing the opening session of two-day talks between ASEAN and its key international partners, Primakov described the regional grouping as a "priority area" in Russia's Asia-Pacific policy.

Primakov said Russia was prepared to join a Eurasian railway construction project and to put its economic and technological capabilities at the disposal of participating countries.

He also proposed establishment of a Space Monitoring and Communication Center in the region to conduct geological surveys and provide information on natural disasters, as well as to help in telecommunications and training.

"The center should cooperate with the 'space' countries, including the arrangement of launches by southeast Asian countries of their own satellites, " he said.

Indian Foreign Minister Inder Kumar Gujral said southeast Asia's remarkable economic progress served as an inspiration for his country in the liberalization of its own economy, and "we know that we too must run to keep pace."

"In this, we would like to travel with our ASEAN kin on a journey of mutual cooperation, benefit and prosperity," Gujral said.

He said the partnership with ASEAN was a part of India's "look-east" destiny, and called for a trebling of India-ASEAN trade to more than 15 billion dollars a year by 2000-2001.

Gujral called for ASEAN capital investment in India's infrastructure development -- ports and shipping, airports, civil aviation, power, telecommunications, roads and railways.

Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen expressed China's support for ASEAN initiatives in boosting Asia-Europe relations and building a Eurasian railway, and expressed its commitment to maintaining regional peace.

"If China is to continue the (economic) growth momentum, it must have a stable social environment and peaceful neighborhood," Qian said.