Soeharto arrives for APEC leaders meeting

Soeharto arrives for APEC leaders meeting

OSAKA, Japan (JP): President Soeharto arrived here yesterday
to attend the third informal meeting of the leaders of the Asia
Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, scheduled for
tomorrow.

Like most of the other 17 APEC leaders, Soeharto arrived two
days ahead of the summit, allowing him to hold separate bilateral
meetings with his colleagues.

The President arrived aboard a Garuda Indonesia DC-10 at
Kansai International airport, together with an entourage
including First Lady Mrs. Tien Soeharto and Minister/State
Secretary Moerdiono.

Other leaders who arrived ahead of Soeharto yesterday were
South Korean President Kim Young-sam, Thai Prime Minister Banharn
Silpa-archa, Koo Chen-fu representing the Taiwan president,
Chilean President Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, Brunei's Sultan
Hassanal Bolkiah, Philippine President Fidel Ramos and Chinese
President Jiang Zemin.

Japanese Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama, the host of
tomorrow's retreat at the Osaka Castle, also arrived yesterday.

Four other leaders who were scheduled to arrive last night
were Hong Kong's financial secretary Donald Tsang, President
Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon of Mexico, Malaysian Prime Minister
Mahathir Mohamad and New Zealand Prime Minister James Bolger.

Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating and Canadian Prime
Minister Jean Chretien arrived on Thursday.

The other three leaders still to arrive today are Singapore's
Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, Papua New Guinea's Prime Minister
Julius Chan and U.S. Vice President Al Gore, who is representing
President Bill Clinton.

Indonesian officials said Soeharto has lined up seven
bilateral meetings for today: Bolger, Keating, Goh, Murayama,
Zedillo, Bolkiah and Koo.

On Sunday, the APEC leaders will meet to endorse an Action
Agenda to liberalize trade in the region by 2020, as they pledged
in Bogor, Indonesia, last year. Each APEC leader is also expected
to announce an initial action, or "down payment", to show that
they are serious with the free trade plan.

Meanwhile, APEC officials dismissed suggestions yesterday that
the absence of Clinton is undermining Sunday's meeting or that it
represented a snub to fellow APEC leaders.

The American president canceled his plan to come here at the
last minute because of a budget confrontation he was facing with
the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress.

"It has nothing to do with APEC and everything to do with an
internal crisis situation," Indonesian Minister of Foreign
Affairs Ali Alatas said. "As the head of state and the president,
we can understand if he wants to stay at home and handle the
crisis," he said.

"We also don't believe that it will have any effect one way or
another on the outcome of the APEC leaders meeting, because I
think everything is already firmly in place and we believe that
it will be a very successful meeting," Alatas added.

U.S. Trade Representative Mickey Kantor also said Clinton's
commitment to APEC and the Asia-Pacific region remains as strong
as before.

"Since the first day in office, he has made this the highest
priority in both our trade and international and foreign policy
commitments, and we will continue to do so." (emb)

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