Saturday, November 06, 2004 (1448 reads)

BEIJING, Nov 6, 2004 (AFP) - Asia's only security forum has agreed to strengthen cooperation against threats such as terrorism, cross-border crime and drug- and small arms-trafficking, state media said on Saturday. Twenty-four members of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), represented by about 100 military officials, made the pledge during the grouping's first security policy conference here, Xinhua news agency said. "The participants said the armed forces of related countries should play active and constructive role in preventing and fighting terrorism by strengthening coordination and cooperation in line with international laws," the report said. ARF links the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations with 13 other Asia-Pacific states and the European Union. boc/th/rcw

Friday, July 29, 2005 (1473 reads)

VIENTIANE, July 29,2005 (AFP) - Asian foreign ministers on Friday welcomed tiny East Timor as the 25th member of the region's main security forum. The country's foreign minister, Nobel peace laureate Jose Ramos-Horta, joined his colleagues at the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), which groups the 10 Association of Southeast Asian Nations with partners including the European Union, United States, China, Japan, Australia and Russia. Ministers took turns to welcome their "good friend" and said they were looking forward to a partnership with the nation of about one million people. East Timor became independent as one of Asia's poorest countries in May, 2002 after a period of UN stewardship following a 1999 referendum to split from Indonesia. Its giant neighbour invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975 to begin years of repressive rule. The United Nations says at least 1,400 people were killed during militia violence organized by the Indonesian security forces ahead of and after the referendum. ARF was established in 1994 to foster dialogue and consultation on political and security issues while aiming to develop confidence-building and preventive diplomacy. In addition to the 10 members of ASEAN -- Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysian, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam -- the ARF groups Australia, Canada, China, the European Union, India, Japan, Mongolia, New Zealand, North Korea, Papua New Guinea, Pakistan, Russia, South Korea, the United States, and now East Timor. fl-it/br/jah

Friday, July 29, 2005 (1907 reads)

VIENTIANE, July 29, 2005 (AFP) - Foreign ministers wrapped up Asia's main security forum Friday with a pledge to step up intelligence sharing on terrorism, which they called a threat to the "peace, order and security" of the region. Concluding a day of ministerial-level talks in the Lao capital of Vientiane, the 25-member ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) vowed to "better exchange relevant information and intelligence in a timely, effective, systematic manner." "The ministers reaffirmed the need to combat by all means, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and international law, threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts," a final statement said. In another signal of commitment to step up information sharing on terrorism, the ARF unveiled a new website which includes a restricted section aimed at speeding up the exchange of intelligence. Most of the forum's members, including Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) members Indonesia and the Philippines, have suffered casualties in bombing attacks. But the issue has gained renewed urgency with the deadly bombings this month in London and the Egyptian resort Sharm el-Sheikh. This has reinforced the need "to increase the frequency and quality of intelligence exchanges to make sure that we're much better coordinated," Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer told reporters here. Another major topic on the agenda was the North Korean issue, said a senior Southeast Asian official. The United States and North Korea resumed their dialogue for the fourth time this week in Beijing after a 13-month hiatus. South Korea, China, Russia and Japan are also party to the talks on ways to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear programs. All the participants are also members of the ARF. As defense officials from the ARF countries prepared Thursday for the ministers' talks, South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-Moon met for the first time in a year with North Korean counterpart Paek Nam-Sun. Ban said relations between the two sides were better than ever. The Korean ministers sat side-by-side at the minister-level ARF meeting Friday, when the forum also welcomed tiny East Timor as its newest member. They also agreed to accept Bangladesh as the 26th member next year. The ARF dialogue concluded a week of annual talks between foreign ministers and officials in the 10-nation ASEAN. That meeting was dominated by a row over Myanmar's 2006 chairmanship, after the European Union and United States threatened to boycott the group's meetings with the military government at the helm. The ARF's final statement expressed concern at the pace of democratisation in Myanmar and called for the country's special UN representative, who has been barred for more than a year, to be allowed to return. ARF's agenda also called for increased cooperation against piracy on the region's vital sea lanes and in responding to disasters like the killer tsunamis that swept the region last December. The forum went ahead without the foreign ministers its three most powerful members: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Japan's Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura and China's Li Zhaoxing. Indian officials confirmed Friday that their foreign minister was also absent. ARF was established in 1994 to foster dialogue and consultation on political and security issues. In addition to ASEAN members Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, the ARF groups Australia, Canada, China, East Timor, the European Union, India, Japan, Mongolia, New Zealand, North Korea, Papua New Guinea, Pakistan, Russia, South Korea the United States. bur-ph/br/mtp

Wednesday, July 19, 2006 (1292 reads)

  North Korea set off fresh alarm bells with its test-launching of seven missiles in defiance of international appeals. The UN Security Council has unanimously condemned the tests and imposed missile-related sanctions. Pyongyang rejected the UN move and threatened to bolster its defences. The communist state has long been locked in a standoff with the United States and its allies over its nuclear weapons program. Six-nation talks aimed at defusing the nuclear tensions have stalled since November.

  South Korea, which has improved ties with North Korea since a 2000 peace summit, has suspended humanitarian aid including food assistance to its neighbour in protest at the missile tests. But Seoul said it would continue peaceful engagement with Pyongyang. The operation of a South Korean-built industrial park at Kaesong in North Korea would remain unaffected by the UN resolution, Ban said. jkw/sm

Wednesday, January 24, 2007 (1379 reads)

KUALA LUMPUR, July 28, 2006 (AFP) - Asia's top security forum on Friday announced sweeping plans to prevent cyber attacks on critical infrastructure and the abuse of online resources by terrorists. The Associations of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Regional Forum, which includes the United States, Russia and China and is known as ARF, moved to boost counter-terrorism measures at its annual meeting in Malaysia. The group adopted a statement saying that the misuse of computer resources by terrorists was a "destructive and devastating form and manifestation of global terrorism." It said the problem was made worse by increased connectivity betwen countries in the region, and that the 26 member nations would establish an ARF-wide alert network on cyber-related crimes.

Friday, July 28, 2006 (1506 reads)

by Harumi Ozawa


KUALA LUMPUR, July 28, 2006 (AFP) - Efforts to coax North Korea to nuclear talks may fail but officials say Japan scored a bonus from Asia's top security forum -- an improvement in its fraught relations with China and South Korea. Tokyo's ties with its East Asian neigbours have been at a low ebb during the past two years, largely because of rows over their World War II history and territorial disputes. China, invaded by Japan in the last century, has refused meetings wth Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi due to his visits to a shrine which honors 2.5 million Japanese dead including 14 top war criminals.

Wednesday, March 02, 2005 (1597 reads)

SINGAPORE, March 2, 2005 (AFP) - Singapore proposed on Wednesday that Asia's only security forum move beyond dialogue and hold maritime security exercises to improve its ability to deal with terrorist and other threats. Defence Minister Teo Chee Hean said in a speech to a seminar on maritime security cooperation tha Asian militaries and their counterparts outside the region "collectively" address security threats in the region's waters. "It would be useful for the ARF (ASEAN Regional Forum) to move beyond dialogue on maritime security and work towards conducting an ARF maritime security exercise in the near future," Teo said. ARF groups 24 countries comprising the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and 14 dialogue partners, including the United States, China, Russia, Japan, Australia and the European Union. The group meets annually to discuss regional and global security issues as well as "confidence-building measures" aimed at forestalling conflicts. Southeast Asia hosts two of the world's most important commercial shipping lanes -- the Malacca Strait and the Singapore Strait bordered by Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia. About half of the world's oil supplies and one fourth of global commerce pass through these narrow waterways. Military officials and security analysts have called for increased patrols in the area amid fears that ships passing through the straits are vulnerable targets for terrorists bent on crippling world trade. Armed piracy is also a major problem in some parts of the Malacca Strait, and the International Maritime Bureau reported on Wednesday that armed assailants had attacked a Malaysian tugboat in the waterway on Monday. The Malaysian captain and the Indonesian chief officer were kidnapped in the incident, according to the bureau. Teo acknowledged that the Five Power Defence Arrangements, an alliance involving Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand and Britain, had already begun conducting martime security drills last year. Another exercise involving 22 navies in the Western Pacific region will also carry out an exercise on maritime security in May. "These are all very positive developments that build confidence, enhance capabilities, and also create a framework for inter-operability that can be useful for future contingencies," Teo said. However he emphasised that much more could be done through the ARF. Senior officers from the navy, coast guard, port authorities, shipping lines and law enforcement agencies from the ARF member nations are attending the two and half-day conference in Singapore this week, most of which will be held behind closed doors. The head of the ARF unit at ASEAN's Jakarta based secretariat, M.C Abad, who was attending the conference, told AFP the gathering was a positive step in improving regional maritime security. "By bringing the frontline agencies together to tackle and promote maritime security, ARF demonstrates that it has gone beyond being a forum for confidence building into an inter-governmental framework pursuing common security," Abad said. "Activities like this demonstrate ARF's relevance in responding head-on to the current security issues of the day." mba/kma/lh

Monday, January 01, 0001 (1163 reads)

Associated Press
Last updated 06:39pm (Mla time) 05/23/2007

MANILA, Philippines -- Asia's largest security forum, which includes the US, the European Union and China, is forming a quick-reaction group to respond to outbreaks of war and political crises, diplomats said Wednesday. The move by the 26-member ASEAN Regional Forum is considered a crucial step in deflecting criticism that it is an annual talk-shop incapable of dealing with security threats and conflicts in the volatile Asia-Pacific region. Senior diplomats meeting in Manila this week are finalizing the creation of the so-called "Friends of the Chair," a four-member ministerial-level group that can be rapidly convened when security threats erupt, said M. C. Abad Jr., a diplomat who helps oversee the forum.

Thursday, July 20, 2006 (1464 reads)

TOKYO, July 20, 2006 (AFP) - Japan and South Korea agreed Thursday to use a regional security forum next week in Malaysia to push for North Korea's return to six-nation talks aimed at dismantling its nuclear arms. The agreement was reached at a meeting of the chief Japanese and South Korean delegates to the six-nation talks, which have been suspended since November, the Japanese foreign ministry said in a statement. The meeting came amid a recent split between the countries over the North. South Korea, which is reconciling with its communist neighbor, has criticized Japan's drive to punish Pyongyang for its July 5 tests of seven missiles. South Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Chun Yung-Woo and Kenichiro Sasae, head of the Japanese ministry's Asian and Oceanian affairs bureau, welcomed a UN Security Council resolution last week condemning the North's tests. They also agreed to use the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) talks in Kuala Lumpur on July 28 to help bring North Korea back to the six-nation talks, the statement said. "The ARF stage will be actively utilised to discuss the future process," it said.

The ARF is a 12-year-old annual forum on security in the Asia-Pacific region that was initiated by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). It now involves foreign ministers from 25 countries, including the two Koreas, Japan, the United States, China and Russia -- all members of the six-party nuclear talks. North Korean Foreign Minister Paek Nam-Sun is due to attend the ARF. The six-way Korean nuclear talks have been stalled since November when Washington rejected Pyongyang's demand for the lifting of US sanctions on a Macau bank accused of money-laundering on the North's behalf. Washington and Seoul have showed interest in holding five-nation talks with Tokyo, Beijing and Moscow. Chun told reporters after meeting Sasae that a five-nation formula was "one option that is being considered but the goal at the moment is to hold six-party talks." Sasae said that the ARF would be a "good opportunity to deal with the North Korean problem." "But it is still premature to say whether or not North Korea will return to the six-nation talks," he said. sps/sct/th
 

Monday, July 30, 2007 (5961 reads)

Friday, July 27, 2007 (The Associated Press) -- Foreign ministers at Asia's top security forum are expected to formally adopt rules next week for creating a group that will respond quickly to emergencies, officials said Friday, in a move seen as enhancing the forum's role beyond an annual talk-shop. Senior officials of the ASEAN Regional Forum, a 27-member group that includes the U.S., China, Russia and the European Union, have agreed on the operating rules for the "Friends of the ARF Chair" — a group of three foreign ministers who will assist the ARF chairman in dealing with regional and international problems, Philippine Foreign Undersecretary Erlinda Basilio said. "After two years it will be adopted, it has been endorsed by the ministers," she added. ARF, founded in 1994 by the 10-country Association of Southeast Asian Nations, has been hobbled by the diversity of its members and its consensus-based decision making. Since its birth, it has focused on building trust among its members through dialogue and confidence-building measures.

Friday, July 29, 2005 (1700 reads)

VIENTIANE, July 29, 2005 (AFP) - Foreign ministers at Asia's largest security dialogue spoke out Friday against tendencies to stereotype Muslims as possible terrorists, addressing a growing concern among the group's Islamic members. Muslim nations at the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in the Lao capital Vientiane have complained that Muslims were being singled out in investigations into attacks and even at immigration check points. The foreign minister of mainly Muslim Malaysia, Syed Hamid Albar, said Thursday his country was concerned at the increasing profiling, particularly by the West, of Muslims as terrorists. "We are worried about the profiling," he was quoted as saying in Vientiane by the official Malaysian news agency Bernama. Syed Hamid complained that the suspicion fell on Muslims immediately after attacks, with police raiding their houses and publicising their pictures. Muslims were also accosted at immigration points because of their "Muslim looks", he said. Addressing these concerns, foreign ministers of the 25-member ARF, which includes the United States, said terrorism should not be identified "with any particular religion or ethnic group." In a statement issued at the end of their annual meeting, they said "terrorism, irrespective of its origins, motivations or objectives, constitutes a threat to all peoples and countries." They also welcomed improved dialogue among different religious faiths in the region. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said the tendency to identify religion with terrorism was misguided. "There is a feeling that we need to make sure that we are not in any ways, as an international community, directing our wrath against Muslims as such," Downer said, adding that such anger must be directed "against criminals and terrorists". People of all faiths should "work together to make sure that those people who commit these acts of murder of innocent people are brought to justice," he said. ASEAN includes the world's biggest Muslim nation, Indonesia, home to the region's biggest terror attack, the 2002 bombings in Bali that killed 202 people, 88 of them Australian. The Bali attack and subsequent strikes in Jakarta have been blamed on the Jemaah Islamiyah, a Southeast Asian affiliate of the Al-Qaeda terror network. Other mostly Muslim nations in ASEAN are Brunei and Malaysia. Largely ethnic Chinese Singapore has a substantial Muslim minority, while Muslims also have a presence in the southern Philippines and southern Thailand. The ARF also includes Pakistan, which has been trying to root out militants believed to be based in its remote tribal regions. Malaysia's Syed Hamid said he had raised his concerns about the stereotyping of Muslims with the European Union. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana also addressed the issue in Vientiane, saying the fight against terrorism should focus not only on the militants and their networks but also on the "root cause" of the problem. This could be done "through education and through better understanding of each other's faiths and societies," Solana said. mba/br/mtp

Thursday, July 27, 2006 (1904 reads)

by Danny Kemp


KUALA LUMPUR, July 27, 2006 (AFP) - US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived for a regional security forum in Malaysia Thursday holding out little hope that North Korea would return to stalled talks on its nuclear weapons. Rice said en route to Kuala Lumpur from a failed Middle East peace conference in Rome that she did not anticipate any resumption here of the six-nation talks that have been on ice since November. Her North Korean counterpart, Foreign Minister Paek Nam-Sun, was due here later Thursday, with no indication that he would respond to diplomatic efforts to get the communist country to the negotiating table. "I don't anticipate any six-party talks," she told reporters aboard her plane. Top US nuclear negotiator Christopher Hill said the other five countries involved -- South Korea, Japan, China, the United States and Russia -- were willing to take part but the North was "lost on the way." "We tried to invite the DPRK to come to a six-party meeting and they showed no interest and I think we therefore are unfortunately not going to be able to have any kind of six-party meeting here," Hill told reporters, referring to the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. However, China remained optimistic that its high-profile campaign to bring North Korea back to the meeting table still had a chance of success. "We very much hope that North Korea will participate," said foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu. North Korea, which has already dominated an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) foreign ministers meeting this week, walked out of the three-year-old talks last year in protest over US financial sanctions. Pyongyang provoked further outrage as well as condemnation by the UN Security Council when it test-fired seven missiles on July 5 that splashed into the Sea of Japan (East Sea). Rice has said that while in Malaysia she would follow up on the North Korea issue with the other participants in the six-way talks. Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is also due in Kuala Lumpur along with the European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana. Police said snipers, sniffer dogs and hundreds of police were in place around the conference venue next to Kuala Lumpur's iconic Petronas towers. The South Korean, Japanese and Chinese foreign ministers joined forces Wednesday and Thursday to breathe life into the nuclear talks, despite underlying bilateral tensions. "The two most important things for us are that North Korea should not take extra measures to worsen the situation and also that the six-way nuclear talks should resume as soon as possible," officials quoted South Korean foreign minister and potential future UN chief Ban Ki-Moon as saying. The Asian powers and the United States have been considering other ways to tackle the issue, although they have disagreed about going ahead without North Korea, with both China and South Korea opposing such a move. US envoy Hill suggested that the talks could be broadened to include other countries, following a South Korean suggestion for multilateral talks also including Malaysia, Australia and Canada. "We are hoping to have a broader discussion on security in Northeast Asia," he said. China, North Korea's major ally, warned late Wednesday it was "seriously concerned" about the situation on the Korean peninsula. Earlier it had said that Friday was pencilled in as a potential date for the talks. Pyongyang dramatically upped the stakes this week, branding Rice a "political imbecile" in retaliation for her description of the missile launches as "completely irresponsible" and "dangerous." Meanwhile the US Secretary of State will face renewed pressure on the Middle East in Asia even as she canvasses support for US positions on North Korea, Myanmar and Iran's nuclear ambitions. Asian ministers have condemned Tuesday's Israeli air strike on a United Nations post in southern Lebanon, which killed four UN observers, and said they would raise the issue with Rice. bur-dk/sls/mc



ASEAN-NKOREA - 07/27/2006 15:32 - AFP
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Service: World News (ASI)
 

Monday, July 30, 2007 (3672 reads)

Monday, May 7, 2007 (By William Pesek, Bloomberg News)--At last month's Boao Forum for Asia, the gathering's secretary general, Long Yongtu, offered a sobering guesstimate: Asia needs at least 50 years to integrate its economies the way Europe has.
An equally sobering thought is that many of those funneling into Kyoto for the Asian development Bank's annual meeting may not live to see the Manila-based institution's dream of a truly amalgamated "Countries in Asia are a long way from the economic convergence that you would need to make monetary integration a realistic possibility," David Burton, director of the International Monetary Fund's Asia-Pacific department, said in Washington last month.
In other words, Asia has a lot of work to do to get to a point where replicating Europe's single currency and its level of economic integration is even a possibility.