The ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute’s annual State of Southeast Asian survey dropped last week, heady times for an overstretched columnist. Not so positive, however, if you’re busy battling a barbarous military junta and are looking around for a bit of moral support from your fellow Southeast Asians. Let’s turn to page 16 of the survey report. … Read more
Thailand expects to open up a humanitarian corridor in about a month to deliver aid to civilians displaced by the conflict in neighboring Myanmar, the country’s Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara said yesterday. Speaking with reporters after inspecting the planned staging area in the busy border town of Mae Sot, a longtime center of refugee aid … Read more
Myanmar’s military junta has sent a senior official to a major meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for the first time since late 2021. According to reporters, Marlar Than Htaik, the permanent secretary of Myanmar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is attending this week’s ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Retreat in Laos. The two-day informal … Read more
The head of Myanmar’s military junta met yesterday with the newly appointed special envoy from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), state media reported, as the military continued to suffer losses in the country’s west and northeast. According to a report today in the Global New Light of Myanmar, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, … Read more
Advertisement ASEAN has always been careful to maintain its neutrality, and as such has been exceedingly unwilling to become embroiled in any hegemonic struggle. Moreover, by inviting the great powers to gatherings like the East Asia Summit (EAS) and the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), where ASEAN itself sits in the driver’s seat and plays a … Read more
Advertisement Usually, the most exciting moments of the annual summits of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are when something doesn’t happen. It has lived long in the memory of political commentators that the regional bloc failed to deliver a joint, post-summit statement in 2012 when Cambodia, as ASEAN chair that year, seemingly put … Read more
Advertisement Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo closed out this week’s run of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summits and meetings by calling on world leaders to step back from the brink of confrontation. Speaking at the close of the 18th East Asia Summit (EAS), which was attended by ASEAN leaders and key foreign counterparts … Read more
Advertisement The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has stiffened its stance toward its conflict-torn problem member Myanmar, with chair Indonesia openly acknowledging the lack of progress in implementing the bloc’s peace plan. In a statement issued yesterday following its annual summit in Jakarta, Southeast Asian leaders “strongly condemned” the continuing violence in Myanmar, and … Read more
Advertisement Southeast Asian leaders decided that Myanmar won’t take over the rotating leadership of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as scheduled in 2026, Asian diplomats and a leader said Tuesday, in the latest blow to efforts by its ruling generals to gain international recognition after violently seizing power in 2021. Western governments led … Read more
Advertisement Southeast Asian leaders led by Indonesian host President Joko Widodo are gathering in their final summit this year, besieged by divisive issues with no solutions in sight: Myanmar’s deadly civil strife, new flare-ups in the disputed South China Sea, and the longstanding United States-China rivalry. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations meetings will open … Read more