ASEAN leaders weigh charter, wrangle over Myanmar
Source: Reuters
(Adds Myanmar comment) By Bill Tarrant CEBU, Philippines, Jan 13 (Reuters) - Southeast Asia leaders met on Saturday to lay the foundation for an economic and political bloc and to endorse a convention on counter-terrorism. Leaders of the Association of South East Asian Nations also had a candid exchange with Myanmar, which escaped censure at the U.N. Security Council after China and Russia on Friday vetoed a U.S. resolution calling on the junta to stop persecuting minority and opposition groups. "How are we going to help you if you are not making progress," Indonesian president told Myanmar at the leaders' initial get-together late on Friday, an ASEAN official who did not want to be identified told reporters. Earlier this week ASEAN foreign ministers told Myanmar it must make greater progress on its "roadmap" for national reconciliation and democracy. Myanmar has exposed splits within a group that has a long tradition of consensus. Some members say ASEAN should not interfere in Myanmar's domestic affairs; others that the junta's sorry human rights record is already an international issue. "ASEAN is pretty divided on the Myanmar issue," one ASEAN official who did not want to be identified told reporters at the Shangri-La hotel where the leaders were meeting. Indonesia's Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda told Reuters the U.N. human rights council should look at Myanmar's persecution of minority and opposition groups not the Security Council. "We share the concern that is expressed at the draft resolution, namely, how to induce changes in Myanmar, in order for Myanmar to make tangible results in their process of democratisation and greater respect for human rights, something we in ASEAN have been trying to assist," Wirajuda said. SUSPEND MEMBERS The 10 leaders, whose members range from an absolute monarchy and military juntas to parliamentary democracies and one-party communist states, have agreed to start drafting a charter that would give ASEAN a legal basis for the first time since it was founded at the height of the Vietnam war nearly 40 years ago. The charter would include systems to monitor and enforce agreements and panels that could issue binding decisions in disputes. The most ground-breaking proposal gives ASEAN, whose combined population of 537 million is greater than the European Union, the power to suspend, or in extreme cases, expel members for serious breaches of the charter. That could possibly put Myanmar's membership in jeopardy if the junta continued to put up roadblocks to democracy. The charter proposals also call for a modification of ASEAN's long-standing principle of non-interference in each other's domestic affairs, enabling it to take decisions on transnational issues such as the perennial "haze" that envelops the region from land-clearing forest fires in Indonesia. Panel chairman and former Philippines president Fidel Ramos said an ASEAN charter would allow the group to compete as a bloc in the "new order" of the 21st century. ASEAN plans to bring forward the establishment of an economic community from 2020 to 2015, according to a draft declaration. The ASEAN leaders arrived in the central Philippines city of Cebu for a summit that was rescheduled from last month amid typhoon and terrorist warnings. They will sign a counter-terrorism agreement that will clamp down on the movement of arms and fighters between its remote islands through information exchange, border controls and a crackdown on terrorist financing. ASEAN leaders will also discuss poverty alleviation in countries that have some of the globe's smallest per capita incomes, and disaster prevention in a region that has seen a devastating tsunami, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, floods, forest fires and pandemics over the last couple of years. ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. (Additional reporting by Carmel Crimmins, Manny Mogato and Chris Buckley) (Editing by Jeremy Laurence; Reuters Messaging: carmel.crimmins.reuters.com@reuters.net; + 63 2 841 8934))
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