RI, South Africa agree to hold Asia-Africa meet at birthplace

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Kuala Lumpur

Inspired by a similar event almost five decades back, the Asian African Sub-regional Organization Conference (ASROC) jointly organized by Indonesia and South Africa in Bandung in April will seek creative measures to rebuild partnership between the two continents.

In their bilateral talks here on Tuesday, Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri and South African President Thabo Mbeki discussed the preparatory steps for the meeting.

"The conference will focus on developing a new partnership between Asia and Africa as part of our efforts to strengthen cooperation between the Nonaligned Movement (NAM) countries," Indonesian Minister of Foreign Affairs Hassan Wirayuda said after the bilateral meeting.

The Bandung conference will coincide with the 47th anniversary of the Asia-Africa conference, which was held at the same place. No less than 20 countries will be invited to the event, although no specific date has not been set for it.

Initiated by noted leaders, including Indonesian president Sukarno, who is Megawati's father, and Egyptian president Gamal Abdul Nasser, the Asia-Africa conference led to the establishment of NAM.

Hassan said that the Asia-Africa forum would return to the West Java capital of Bandung in memory of the conference almost 50 years ago.

A follow-up meeting will be held in Johannesburg in 2004.

It was Megawati who proposed the idea of bringing back the Asia-Africa spirit during the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit last year, when she stressed the importance of reviving cooperation between the two continents, which many consider to be unfruitful.

Hassan further disclosed that Megawati will actively participate in the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC) informal consultative meeting on Wednesday, which will be attended by 50 out of 59 members of the organization.

"The informal meeting is set to discuss issues of common interest, for the Islamic countries to close ranks regarding the crisis in Iraq," the minister said, adding that an OIC emergency summit will be held in Qatar on March 5.

Megawati has been invited by Qatar Sultan Sheik Abdulla bin Khalifa Al-Thani to attend the summit in Doha. A presidential source said that Megawati would leave for Qatar on March 2.

On Tuesday, Megawati also held bilateral meetings with Sri Lanka President Chandrika B. Kamaratunga and Vietnam President Tran Duc Luong.

The President is slated to return to Indonesia on Wednesday, after attending the OIC informal meeting.