The new East Asia: The shape of things to come

Kavi Chongkittavorn, The Nation, Asia News Network, Bangkok

Refer to East Asia whatever way you want because it does not matter anymore. By December, East Asia will be East Asia only in name, once events in Kuala Lumpur lead to the conception of a broader Asia. This new, emerging Asia will be the key mover and shaker of the decades to come.

ASEAN leaders agreed recently that the first East Asian Summit (EAS) will have a new beginning as a separate non-exclusive process from ASEAN plus three, which has been the preferred cooperative mechanism.

India has been invited to join the new forum as a founding member. As such, East Asia has incorporated the world's largest democracy, which will inject much dynamism into the region. For the first time, all key Asian countries will be gathered under one roof.

In the past, India was shut out from the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation and the Asia Europe Meeting. With the EAS, India has been given the new identity of being part of East Asia.

East Asia is an evolving concept. Prior to 1997, it only covered the three Northeast Asian countries -- China, Korea and Japan -- together with Taiwan and Hong Kong, which were considered the region's developed economies. To mark the 30th anniversary of ASEAN in 1997, the leaders from China, Japan, South Korea and the grouping came together in Kuala Lumpur. Since then, they have been holding a yearly summit and possess a strong sense of shared destiny.

From 1997 onward, East Asia cast broader geographic footprints, stretching from the Sea of Japan to the Strait of Malacca. Of course, ASEAN being ASEAN, the grouping insisted on calling this cooperation the ASEAN plus three process.

Later this year, the process will give way to the EAS, which will stretch from the Andaman Sea and Indian Ocean to incorporate India.

That is good news. For decades, ASEAN has guarded its territory very dearly, making sure that whatever new undertakings the grouping initiated did not undermine its unity, norms and principles. The feeling of non-exclusiveness is new and has been echoed by Indonesia and Singapore, which have been backing such thinking all along.

If this spirit continues, Asia, also known as East Asia, will avoid the pitfalls of the recent past, which saw the grouping squabbling over trivial, nitty-gritty issues, hindering deeper and broader integration with the regional economies.

ASEAN has set three criteria for the prospective EAS members. First, they must have substantive relations with ASEAN and support the principles enshrined in the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC). Finally, they must be dialogue partners.

Strange as it may seem, these criteria are aimed at attracting Australia and New Zealand to the party. It is still early to tell if these two countries will make it. They are negotiating with ASEAN to find proper wordings to ensure the second criteria is met in a spirit of pragmatism.

Australia has already had a change of heart and is now ready to go beyond the usual ASEAN-Australia tango. Canberra is now willing to express support for the TAC. If this happens in time for the ASEAN ministerial meeting in July in Vientiane, then Australia and New Zealand could be included in the EAS.

It is amazing how this regional cooperation has expanded. When ASEAN started out in 1967, it had only five countries. In 1984, Brunei was added. The real enlargement came during 1995-2000 when Vietnam, Burma, Laos and Cambodia joined the grouping. But within a decade, East Asia has expanded from three countries to thirteen, then fourteen. With the possibility of the two from Down Under coming in at the late minute, it could be sixteen.

Will EAS be like the ASEAN Regional Forum, with 24 countries across the Asia-Pacific region? For the time being, this will not be the case. In the next few years, EAS leaders will need to consolidate their new forum to ensure their relevance, especially when it comes to articulating issues to be discussed.

After all, ASEAN hopes that with a 16-member, non-exclusive EAS, the U.S. will feel more at ease with Asian cooperation and realize it is not aimed at competing with the U.S., as the original East Asian Grouping was in the early 1990s.

With India and the two from Down Under on board, the EAS will become a pivotal driving force for the region, and will have much to do with ASEAN's future attitudes. If it remains outward- looking, as it appears to be now, the EAS will take off and fly. But some ASEAN members are still fearful of losing a grip on the process they initiated -- so much so that they want to increase Asea's control, with proposals like ASEAN-chaired meetings and reserving the right to choose prospective EAS countries.

If such a myopic perspective and insecurity is allowed to take hold, it will affect EAS's vibrancy and create unnecessary tension and delays. Therefore, it is incumbent on the core ASEAN countries to make sure that the strengthening of the EAS will continue unabated.

It will not be long before we know whether the EAS will mark a new frontier of cooperation or more wishful thinking dreamt up by the media.