Asean leaders 'face challenge to retain creed'

A NEWLY enlarged Asean will find it challenging to keep to its fundamental creed of not interfering in the internal affairs of member states, speakers at an Asia-Pacific conference at the weekend said.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations - despite pressure from the West to deny Burma membership because of its human rights record - will admit Burma, Laos and Cambodia at the grouping's annual meeting in Kuala Lumpur next month.

Asean - currently grouping Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam - has insisted its policy of "constructive engagement" will nudge Burma's military rulers along the path of reform.

Yusuf Wanandi, chairman of the Supervisory Board of Indonesia's Centre for Strategic and International Studies, called for Asean to give Rangoon "a roadmap" for political and economic reforms.

"Despite the principle of non-intervention in each other's domestic affairs, there is always an exception to be made, and on Myanmar [Burma] it is right to do so," Mr Wanandi said at a seminar on Asean at the Asia-Pacific Roundtable on Saturday.

Asean can also give some advice to the feuding factions in Cambodia to avoid violent confrontation there, Mr Wanandi said.

Relations between Cambodia's co-premiers, Prince Norodom Ranariddh and Hun Sen, have been strained to near breaking point in the run-up to next year's general elections, paralysing the legislature.

Mr Wanandi noted that Asean played a key role in paving the way to ending Cambodia's long civil war.

Brunei delegate Timothy Ong questioned whether all Asean members were prepared to see the group abandon its cherished principle of non-interference.

"Strict adherence to that principle made it possible for Brunei to join in 1984.

"And strict adherence allowed Asean to withstand the excesses of the Marcos regime in the Philippines."

Mr Wanandi said in response that the media and non-governmental organisations in Asean countries had broken the taboo of criticism over issues like Indonesia's human rights record in East Timor and Burma.

"Are we going to recognise this and come to some terms of reference on how to intervene? It is a real problem we have to face and think seriously about from now on."

Mr Wanandi called for a regional assembly that could air potentially contentious issues, saying that Asean was overly defined by its leaders and senior officials.

Jose Almonte, Presidential Security Adviser and Director-General of the National Security Council in the Philippines, said the 10-member Asean would help to safeguard the region from outside intervention and increase its attraction for foreign investors.

The new Asean would "prevent Southeast Asia from becoming an arena of their strategic competition, as it was for much of the past 50 years".