China has an hidden agenda in its recent exercise of Mekong diplomacy - to lobby the 5 Mekong countries to vote against the tabling of any discussion on territorial dispute with Vietnam and Malaysia.
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In the past, Singapore has been the uncontested intellectual leader of Asean, providing new ideas related to economic and security matters to reinvent and make Asean relevant to the global community.
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In an apparent demonstration of its growing maritime enforcement capabilities, the Chinese navy last month ended a long-range deployment into the South China Sea. The exercise included some of China’s most modern warships and lasted nearly three weeks.
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While political tension continues to escalate between the Red Shirts and the Abhisit government in Bangkok, civil society actors from Cambodia and Thailand came together to make a stand for peace and solidarity to resolve the long-standing border disputes between both countries.
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As the Summit progressed, it brought froth the advances in the collective effort to form an ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by 2015. Beginning 1 January 2010, ASEAN has effectively established the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA). ASEAN-6 achieved full liberalization of 99.6 percent of the total tariff lines and CLMV countries (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar...
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There are questions of whether the current regional groupings in the Asia-Pacific (APEC, ASEAN+, East Asia Summit) are adequate. There are also questions of what would constitute the ideal regional framework, and how to get there. In the past year, Australia and Japan have each floated visions of new regional frameworks: The Asia-Pacific Community...
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Public lecture by Anwar Ibrahim at the London School of Economics, March 18, 2010. Click 'play' to listen to the audio recording of the speech (which includes a Q&A session). The speech transcript is available below.
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The Obama administration is sending a sizable high-powered team to attend the upcoming APEC Summit in Singapore; it also finds it noteworthy that the side-meeting between the US and all ten ASEAN countries is finally taking place and sees it as a reaction against China’s recent diplomatic successes.
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The adoption of certain human rights ideal should take into account the socio-economic environment. Min Cheong
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Government intervention at the ASEAN People's Forum is two-fold. Donaldson Tan
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