U.S. tries to unravel E. Asia summit puzzle

U.S. tries to unravel E. Asia summit puzzle

P. Parameswaran, Agence France-Presse/Washington

The United States calls it a "black box", but beyond the mystery
of the upcoming inaugural East Asia Summit is anxiety over the
future direction of the forum in a region where China is stamping
its mark.

The summit is scheduled to be held in Kuala Lumpur in December
among the 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) as well as China, Japan, South Korea, India,
Australia, New Zealand.

The original idea was to turn the annual leaders' meeting
between ASEAN members and China, Japan and South Korea -- under
the existing "ASEAN plus three" process -- into an East Asian
Summit as part of ambitious plan to create an East Asian
community backed by a regionwide free trade area.

But Singapore, Japan and Indonesia particularly objected,
fearing it would alienate the United States and lead to possible
Chinese dominance. They lobbied for the expansion of the forum to
cover Australia, New Zealand and India.

Still, China and some of the ASEAN states remain hopeful that
the "ASEAN plus three" vehicle is the umbrella forum to forge an
East Asian community.

As the upcoming summit has expanded to cover countries beyond
the geographic notion of East Asia, the question has arisen
whether the United States -- which is on the other side of the
Pacific -- should be a participant.

"It's a question we get all the time: what is our policy on
the East Asia summit? Quite frankly, we haven't determined a
policy because the East Asia summit, if you really look at it, is
a black box," said deputy U.S. assistant secretary of state Eric
John.

"Nobody knows what the East Asia summit is other than leaders
coming together," he told a recent Congressional hearing when
legislators asked why the United States, being the Asia-Pacific
region's largest economic and military power, was not invited to
join the forum.

One key unanswered question is whether the forum would tackle
political, economic or security issues, John said.

"But once the forum begins to take form, we will study how we
can engage. Until that time, I would hesitate to push for an
invitation to an organization we don't know what it does," he
explained.

The three prerequisites for participation in the East Asian
summit are member countries should have substantial relations
with ASEAN, be an ASEAN dialog Partner and accede to a non-
aggression treaty known as the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation.

While other big powers Russia, China and India have become
signatories to underscore security commitment to the region, the
United States said it has no current plans to sign up.

Even so, Russia's application to join the first summit has
been rejected on the basis that Moscow does not have substantial
relations with the region.

But when ASEAN accepted Russia as a dialog partner several
years ago, it was due to its strategic importance and not
relations with the region, some experts said, raising doubts over
the basis for membership of the summit and the direction it would
take.

Ralph Cossa of the Hawaii-based Pacific Forum, a wing of the
U.S. Center of Strategic and International Studies, asked: Is the
East Asia Summit the primary vehicle for building and sustaining
the East Asia community? Are the two synonymous?

"The relationship needs to be better defined, since there are
many competing views of what constitutes East Asia and what
vehicles will best create this sense of community," Cossa said in
a recent paper "The Emerging East Asian Community: Should
Washington be Concerned?"

He also asked whether Washington should be included as a
member, or at least an observer, in this evolving East Asia
community.

"The East Asia Summit is new territory for ASEAN and we have
to wait for the summit to provide a guidemap to reveal its
contours," said Pek Koon Heng of American University's School of
International Service. "The concept is a bit amorphous."

It is very unlikely that the summit would lay the groundwork
for an East Asian community, one Southeast Asian diplomat said,
adding that such a mammoth task cannot be undertaken by a forum
which has no implementation mechanism.

"It is going to be a forum for strategic dialog. There would
be no mechanism, for the time being, to promote any kind of
cooperation," one diplomat said.