19th ASEAN Summit

The 19th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit, gathering heads of state or government from 10 ASEAN member states – Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore and Vietnam – was held in Bali (Indonesia) on November 17–19. The summit, themed "ASEAN Community in a Global Community of Nations", is chaired by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
After some 12 months of intense meetings and activities, which left a new landmark in ASEAN's history, Indonesia handed over the chair of the group to Cambodia today.
Visibly proud of what Indonesia's achievements over the past year, President Yudhoyono handed over the symbolic gavil to Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen. The simple but dignified ceremony was heralded by a short video of the highlights of ASEAN 2011.
For many delegates in the audience – particularly the exhausted staff of the ASEAN Secretariat – it was a moment of nostalgia, relief, and pride, as they were reminded of the activities which they had slogged for.
Bali Declaration
Leaders of the 19th ASEAN Summit stressed high political determination and the allocation of necessary resources to implement on schedule the process to build the ASEAN Community on three pillars. They also stressed the fully implementation of the Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity, which is important in the process to build a consolidated ASEAN Community by 2015, considering it a leading priority in the cooperation within ASEAN and between ASEAN and its partners.
Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung asked ASEAN to continue boosting cooperation and proper investment in such fields as narrowing the gap of development, promoting security, energy, and food security as well as boosting cooperation to effectively deal with emerging challenges, namely climate change, maritime security, environment, the sustainable use of water sources of rivers, especially the Mekong river to contributing to sustainable and uniform development in the region.
On ASEAN Connectivity, the PM stressed the significance of the full implementation of the Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity in the process of building the ASEAN Community by 2015, saying that this continues to be the top priority in ASEAN cooperation as well as cooperation between ASEAN and its partner countries.
The Vietnamese prime minister added: “The group needs to efficiently implement agreements and commitments on trade liberalization, facilitation of goods and services transactions, investment and people-to-people exchanges, an initial study on implementation of ASEAN Travel Cards for ASEAN citizens, as well as special immigration desks for regional citizens at international border gates of the member countries.”
The Bali Summit addressed a broad range of issues impacting the region such as global economy, G20 Summit, disaster management, climate change, food and energy security, regional integration, among others, and adopted several outcome documents, including the Bali Declaration on ASEAN Community in a Global Community of Nations.
Foreign Ministers’ Meet
The ASEAN foreign ministers have agreed on the need for talks with Beijing over the South China Sea dispute.
After the meeting, Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said that ASEAN seeks dialogue with China over the maritime issue. He also said the foreign ministers were encouraged by Myanmar's attempts at reforms, as Napyidaw says it will release more prisoners under an amnesty deal.
ASEAN-UN Engagement
At the fourth ASEAN-UN Summit, the ASEAN leaders and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon reviewed the implementation of the decisions of the previous summit, which took place in Hanoi in October 2010.
The ASEAN leaders spoke highly of the support of the UN and its agencies for ASEAN in building the Community, realising the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), strengthening regional connectivity, narrowing the development gaps and boosting the development of subregions, especially the Mekong Subregion, improving the capacity to cope with climate change and natural disasters, reduce poverty and prevent diseases as well as boosting the reasonable and sustainable exploitation and use of water resources.

G-8 And G-5 Summits

If the latest Group of Eight (G-8) Summits of eight most developed countries of the world and Group of Five (G-5) of the most developing countries in the Italian city of L'Aquila had raised any new ray of hope in this world surrounded by challenges, it does not seem to be getting fulfilled.
However, the top leadership of the world took notice of serious issues and problems, indulged in sweet talk about them, also released declarations with high intentions, but they have neither decided on any agenda nor have shown any commitment, so that one could say that they have really moved forward in the direction of solving the problems.

Climate Change
An important proof of the narrow and selfish viewpoint of the leadership of developed countries comes from their attitude to the issue of global warming. It is a fact that most of the G-8 countries are among countries emitting highest amount of carbon.
Climate change is affecting farm output, making droughts, floods and storms more severe and more frequent and raising the sea level. India is one of the worst-affected countries. The G-5--India, China, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico--is suggesting that at least one per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the developed countries should go towards checking climate change.
Global Non- Governmental Organisations (NGOs) shadowing the G-8 and G-5 summits stated that any possibility of the G-8 countries coming with a 2020 target had been scupperred by Russia, which has long opposed any cap on its greenhouse gas emissions.
But they are not in favour of a scheduled effective reduction in it. In this summit too, they did not make any such promise. As a result, the Italy declaration on climate change has become as hollow as numerous declarations earlier on the subject.

Dealing Economic Recession
After dealing with issues of climate change, trade and global economic downturn, the G-8 and G-5 countries turned their attention to food security pledging to mobilise US $20 billion over three years by substantially increasing aid to agriculture for achieving food security across the nations.
In fact, the most immediate challenge today is certainly to rescue the world from economic recession and to bring the economies back on track. With the onset of recession, the most vocal advocates of globalization, the developed countries, had started taking measures to safeguard their economic interests, which were termed as protectionist measures.
Under pressure of world opinion, it has been announced that they would refrain from such steps, but there is no concrete structure of it in place. Reforms in the organizational structure of global financial institutions and the need for them to provide more financial aid to underdeveloped countries has also not moved forward beyond simple announcement.

Trade Restrictions
Trade protectionist policies of some countries, especially in the times of global economic crisis, have been given a thumb down by the joint declaration of the G-8 and G-5 Summits. Developing countries, led by India, China and Brazil, stated that the conclusion of a multilateral trade agreement would help stimulate economies hit by the global downturn and for this to happen developed nations must agree to eliminate trade-distorting subsidies.
The leaders of India, Brazil, South Africa, China and Mexico agreed that there is a need to conclude the Doha Round of negotiations, the latest round of which was stalled due to differences between India and the US on farm subsidies, and find solutions to the remaining gaps.
The Doha Development Round must deliver real and improved market access to developing country products and services and also ensure meaningful results where the greatest distortions lie, eliminating export subsidies in developing countries.
The emerging economies and developing countries had been saying that they were worst hit by the economic crisis and protectionist policies would spell doom for their economies. The declaration sought an ambitious and balanced conclusion to the Doha development round in 2010. It stated in order to fill remaining gaps in negotiations, ministers in-charge of trade had been instructed to explore all possible avenues of direct engagement within the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Oil Speculation
The G-8 nations have asked international bodies to study ways of intervening in oil markets to block speculation.
The leaders at the summit also expressed our disapproval over the resumption of speculation internationally. Despite oil consumption falling one percent from 2008, oil prices have risen from $30 a barrel to $70 a barrel.

India’s Initiative
The Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh raised several correct and necessary issues on this occasion. He also succeeded to some extent in making them a part of the declaration.
However, India still has to go a long way to have an effective role of its voice in the world. From this viewpoint, the proposal to turn the G-8 and G-5, which together represent 80 percent population of the world, into a G-14 is worth a welcome.
The question is if the leaders of the world fail to take concrete steps with mutual consent such summits would be reduced to international picnics.