Southeast Asian ministers urged Cambodia and Thailand yesterday to show restraint over a military standoff on their border and took steps to create a regional human rights body.
The 10 members of ASEAN were also tackling spiraling food and fuel prices at their annual meeting yesterday, as worsening inflation adds to political turbulence in the region.
The group, seeking to create an EU-style community encompassing half a billion people with a combined GDP of US$1.2 trillion, was set to again express profound disappointment with junta-ruled Myanmar, its most problematic member, a draft communique said.
With Thailand and Cambodia holding high-level talks yesterday aimed at resolving the dispute over a 900-year-old temple on their border, ASEAN ministers offered to help mediate.
“The situation has escalated dangerously, with troops from both sides faced off on disputed territory near the Preah Vihear temple,” Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) said in a speech opening the meeting. “ASEAN could not stand idly by without damaging its credibility.”
The group’s diplomacy on the issue “reflects a growing sense that ASEAN is no longer just a ‘talk-shop,’ but a maturing community of nations prepared to act to advance its collective interests,” the prime minister said, adding that they had received assurances that Thailand and Cambodia would show “utmost restraint” to avoid armed conflict over a dangerous border dispute.
After a week of diplomatic sparring and a build-up of troops, expectations for a breakthrough were low, but both sides said they wanted to ease tensions.
The foreign ministers are discussing “the growing challenge posed by rising oil and food prices ... to our people’s welfare as well as our countries’ continued economic development,” the draft joint communique said.
The high-growth economies of Southeast Asia are worried global financial turmoil could lead to a replay of the “Asian contagion” financial crisis of 1997 to 1998, one official from the Philippines said.
ASEAN aims to sign a landmark charter at its annual summit in December that would create an EU-style community among its members, although three countries — Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines — have yet to ratify the document.
ASEAN’s inability to get Myanmar’s junta to reform has been a major stumbling block in its ambition to exert economic and diplomatic muscle.
But on Sunday, Singaporean Foreign Minister George Yeo saidcomments from foreign minister Nyan Win indicated generals could release detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in about half a year.
Asked whether the Myanmar’s minister’s comments meant she could be freed in the coming months, Yeo said: “I am just repeating to you what he told me and I think that is not an inaccurate inference.”
Also See: Myanmar ratifies ASEAN charter
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
US President Donald Trump yesterday announced sweeping "reciprocal tariffs" on US trading partners, including a 32 percent tax on goods from Taiwan that is set to take effect on Wednesday. At a Rose Garden event, Trump declared a 10 percent baseline tax on imports from all countries, with the White House saying it would take effect on Saturday. Countries with larger trade surpluses with the US would face higher duties beginning on Wednesday, including Taiwan (32 percent), China (34 percent), Japan (24 percent), South Korea (25 percent), Vietnam (46 percent) and Thailand (36 percent). Canada and Mexico, the two largest US trading
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
RSS