[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index ][Thread Index ]

Asean Leaders 'face challenge to re (r)



Subject: Asean Leaders 'face challenge to retain creed' 


South China Morning Post
Monday  June 9  1997

Asean  Leaders 'face challenge to retain creed' 


REUTER in Kuala Lumpur 
A newly enlarged Asean will find it challenging to keep to its fundamental 
creed of not interfering in the internal affairs of member states, speakers at 
an Asia-Pacific conference at the weekend said.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations - despite pressure from the West to 
deny Burma membership because of its human rights record - will admit Burma, 
Laos and Cambodia at the grouping's annual meeting in Kuala Lumpur next month.

Asean - currently grouping Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, the Philippines, 
Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam - has insisted its policy of "constructive 
engagement" will nudge Burma's military rulers along the path of reform.

Yusuf Wanandi, chairman of the Supervisory Board of Indonesia's Centre for 
Strategic and International Studies, called for Asean to give Rangoon "a 
roadmap" for political and economic reforms.

"Despite the principle of non-intervention in each other's domestic affairs, 
there is always an exception to be made, and on Myanmar [Burma] it is right to 
do so," Mr Wanandi said at a seminar on Asean at the Asia-Pacific Roundtable 
on Saturday.

Asean can also give some advice to the feuding factions in Cambodia to avoid 
violent confrontation there, Mr Wanandi said.

Relations between Cambodia's co-premiers, Prince Norodom Ranariddh and Hun 
Sen, have been strained to near breaking point in the run-up to next year's 
general elections, paralysing the legislature.

Mr Wanandi noted that Asean played a key role in paving the way to ending 
Cambodia's long civil war.

Brunei delegate Timothy Ong questioned whether all Asean members were prepared 
to see the group abandon its cherished principle of non-interference.

"Strict adherence to that principle made it possible for Brunei to join in 
1984.

"And strict adherence allowed Asean to withstand the excesses of the Marcos 
regime in the Philippines."

Mr Wanandi said in response that the media and non-governmental organisations 
in Asean countries had broken the taboo of criticism over issues like 
Indonesia's human rights record in East Timor and Burma.

"Are we going to recognise this and come to some terms of reference on how to 
intervene? It is a real problem we have to face and think seriously about from 
now on."

Mr Wanandi called for a regional assembly that could air potentially 
contentious issues, saying that Asean was overly defined by its leaders and 
senior officials.

Jose Almonte, Presidential Security Adviser and Director-General of the 
National Security Council in the Philippines, said the 10-member Asean would 
help to safeguard the region from outside intervention and increase its 
attraction for foreign investors.

The new Asean would "prevent Southeast Asia from becoming an arena of their 
strategic competition, as it was for much of the past 50 years".

South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd.