Min Cheong
President of Indonesia, H.E. Dr. H Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, delivering the keynote address at The Shangri-La Dialogue 2012
The 11th Asia Security Summit, the Shangri-La Dialogue 2012, opened in Singapore yesterday, on the 1st of June, with a noteworthy roster of defence leaders and senior officials in attendance.
Defence ministers, chiefs of defence staff, top security analysts, and military and intelligence chiefs convened at the Summit, which will run from the 1st to 3rd of June, to discuss important strategic developments and other key issues affecting international security.
The Dialogue will also be a platform for defence ministers to make policy announcements on current strategic and defence issues and to facilitate private bilateral and multilateral meetings.
Dr John Chipman, Director-General and Chief Executive of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) said, “This year brings together twenty-seven government delegations clearly recognising the Shangri-La Dialogue as an indispensable part of the region’s security infrastructure. The Summit, now more than ever, is a crucial platform for understanding and collaboration between governments, for the discussion of key security issues in the region, and ultimately for the prevention and resolution of international conflict.”
The agenda for the 11th Shangri-La Dialogue will feature five plenary sessions on: “US Defence Policy in an Era of Austerity”; “Protecting Maritime Freedoms”; “Deterrence and Regional Stability”; “New Forms of Warfare, Cyber UAVs and Emerging Threats”; and “Emerging Risks to Global and Asia- Pacific security”.
The Dialogue will also include five closed-door special sessions on: “Containing the South China Sea Disputes”; “The Armed Forces and Domestic Emergencies”; “Northeast Asian Dangers and Opportunities”; “Submarines and Regional Security”; and “South Asia’s Growing Security Threats”.
On the evening of the 1st of June, H.E. Dr. H Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, President of the Republic of Indonesia, delivered the keynote speech entitled “An Architecture For Durable Peace in the Asia Pacific”.
In his address, he spoke of seizing strategic opportunities to develop a resilient framework for peace in the Asia Pacific region and highlighted three key elements essential for achieving this – the cultivation of Regionalism, maintenance of a dynamic equilibrium for power relationships and the nurturing of a strategic culture premised upon a win-win mindset.
Countries represented at this year’s Dialogue comprise: Australia, Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Republic of Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, New Zealand, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Timor-Leste, UK, US, and Vietnam.
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Photo courtesy of the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
The International Institute for Strategic Studies is a world-leading authority on global security, political risk and military conflict. The IISS was founded in the UK in 1958 with a focus on nuclear deterrence and arms control. Today, it is also renowned for its annual Military Balance assessment of countries’ armed forces and for its high-powered security summits, including the Shangri-La Dialogue.
