[A-List] Towards East Asian Community - I

["Sabri Oncu" <soncu@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

BBC Worldwide Monitoring
December 8, 2005 Thursday

Malaysia East Asia Summit bypassed in East Asian community plan

Kuala Lumpur, 8 December: The goal of an East Asian community will not be
mentioned in a statement to be issued by the inaugural East Asia Summit
[EAS] next week, official sources said Thursday [8 December].

Senior officials from the 16 EAS participating countries, who are preparing
for Wednesday's summit of their leaders in Kuala Lumpur, have agreed at
their meeting that a declaration to be issued by the leaders will only
mention "community building in the region" and avoid an explicit reference
to the proposed East Asian community goal.

The decision on the wording was reached after "much difficulty" due to a tug
of war between two sides, an ASEAN [Association of Southeast Asian Nations]
official said. On one side is a group of countries including Japan that want
the EAS to play a role in building the East Asian bloc. On the other is a
group of countries including China and most Southeast Asian nations that
want the existing ASEAN plus Three mechanism of meetings by ASEAN and its
northeast Asian neighbours Japan, China and South Korea to assume the lead
role. 

The EAS, which has been initiated by the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations, involves not only the 10 ASEAN member countries, Japan, China and
South Korea but also India, Australia and New Zealand, which are not
regarded as East Asian.

Contrary to expectations, ASEAN appears to be bypassing the EAS in embryonic
efforts to create the bloc amid concerns that ASEAN could be overshadowed by
the bigger powers in the EAS and that the ASEAN plus Three meetings could
become obsolete one day if the EAS role is elevated.

Hence, ASEAN has arranged for next week's EAS meeting to be a retreat only.

The priority that ASEAN places on the ASEAN plus Three meetings can be
easily seen when draft statements for the two meetings, obtained by Kyodo
News, are compared.

A draft copy of the EAS declaration makes no mention at all of an East Asian
community, while the draft declaration of the ASEAN plus Three summit speaks
of the "East Asian community as a long-term goal".

The "ASEAN plus Three process will continue to be the main vehicle in
achieving that goal, with ASEAN as the driving force and with the active
participation of the ASEAN plus Three countries in order to promote a sense
of shared ownership," the ASEAN plus Three draft statement says.

Indonesia and some EAS members, such as Japan, have been pushing for the
inclusion of at least the general term "community building in East Asia" in
the EAS declaration.

The draft EAS declaration states only that the 16 EAS participating
countries "could play a strategic role in community building in this
region", avoiding altogether the use of the term "East Asian community."

China's insistence that the East Asian community should be created only by
ASEAN and the three Northeast Asian countries reflects Beijing's desire to
play a leadership role in the region, analysts say.

Japan prefers the EAS with its wider membership to get involved in East
Asian community building, apparently to dilute China's growing regional
ambitions.

Indonesian officials tried to persuade other ASEAN plus Three members during
a working lunch Wednesday to allow the EAS to have a role in East Asia's bid
to create a bloc, ASEAN sources said.

"Why should the EAS not play a role in East Asian community building? It is
an ASEAN initiative," said Indonesian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Marty
Natalegawa. "There are various ways to achieve an East Asian community. It
should be multi-track. The EAS could add value to what has already existed
so far."

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