S'pore, RP aim for more cooperation

S'pore, RP aim for more cooperation

SINGAPORE (AP): Officials from Singapore and the Philippines
agreed Monday to boost economic cooperation between their
countries, an official said.

Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong and Philippine Vice
President Teofisto Guingona agreed that "more could be done" to
implement an economic cooperation "action plan" established
earlier between the two Southeast Asian nations, Goh's spokesman
said. He gave no further details.

The action plan includes cooperation in information
technology, tourism and other areas, said spokesman Ong Keng
Yong.

Singapore aggressively promotes information technology, or IT,
as a key to prosperity in the high-tech "new economy" of the 21st
century. The wealthy city-state has urged other countries in the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, to raise
computer literacy and build Internet infrastructure.

In their discussions in Singapore Monday, Goh told Guingona
that Filipinos' English-language proficiency gives the country a
natural advantage because "most IT work is done in English," Ong
said.

Guingona was in Singapore Sunday and Monday during an official
tour of ASEAN countries. He is also the Philippines' foreign
secretary.

Guingona and Goh also discussed how ASEAN "can be strengthened
so that more foreign investors will be attracted to the region,"
Goh's office said in a statement.

ASEAN, a 10-member economic and political bloc formed more
than three decades ago, has recently drawn criticism for failing
to provide more help in dealing with problems, including Asia's
1997-98 economic crisis and recurrent brush fires in Indonesia
that sometimes blanket other countries in the region with severe
pollution.

ASEAN members are Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.