Partnership may help free Asia, Africa from poverty: RI
Ivy Susanti, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Indonesian Minister of Foreign Affairs Hassan Wirayuda expressed optimism that a strategic partnership between Asian and African countries could help free both continents from the grip of poverty.
Hassan said that the proposed partnership, which will be promoted during the Asian-African Summit next month, would be based on the principles of common ownership, shared conviction and mutual respect and benefit.
"Individually, most of our countries are poor but together we have the resources and the skills to solve many of the problems of development that we are facing. Moreover, by working in concert, we can make a difference in today's globalized world and contribute significantly to the conquest of poverty in our time," he said.
Hassan's speech marked the formal opening of the Senior Officials' Meeting (SOM), which will end on Thursday, and precedes the Asian-African Summit and the Commemoration of the Golden Jubilee of the Asia-Africa Conference next month.
The Summit will be held from April 22 to April 23 in Jakarta, while the Commemoration will take place in the West Java capital of Bandung, which hosted the 1955 Conference. The outcome of the 1955 Summit, called the Ten Principles of Bandung, is touted by Indonesia as having served as a "code of conduct" governing the two continents' relations.
Hassan said that the new partnership would focus on security and politics, economics and the sociocultural field.
"We will have to explore and arrive at innovative ways and modalities for the launching and strengthening of our cooperation in the politico-security, economic and sociocultural fields, which will form the three pillars of our overall cooperation," Hassan said in Tuesday's speech.
"Encompassing an area that is almost half of the world, Asia and Africa are home to 4.6 billion people or 73 percent of the world's population. The combined Gross Domestic Product of the two continents amounts to US$9.3 trillion. These statistics point to one clear fact: our potential for development is enormous."
"We cannot realize our collective potential, however, unless we are able to establish a formal and strategic partnership that ties our two regions in a vigorous, pragmatic and forward-looking way -- a partnership that will give form and flesh to the Bandung spirit."
He said that Indonesia and South Africa had jointly sponsored the ministerial-level Asian-African Sub-Regional Organization Conferences (AASROC) in Bandung in July 2003 and in Durban, South Africa, in August 2004 to pave the way for these initiatives.
Host Indonesia has invited 106 countries to participate in the Asian-African Summit.
Hassan also emphasized that the initiative would have to involve all components of society.
"Apart from the public sector, we must enlist the private business sector, academia, the media and all of civil society into sharing ownership of our interregional and strategic partnership."
The initial Asia-Africa Conference was held in Bandung from April 18 to April 24, 1955, upon the invitation of the Prime Ministers of Burma (now Myanmar), Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), India, Indonesia and Pakistan. Twenty-four countries, including five current members of ASEAN, took part back then.
The Conference inspired a global peace effort through the loose grouping known as the Non-Aligned Movement, as well as the Group of 77.