NAYPYIDAW: Myanmar yesterday welcomed its biggest gathering of world leaders since shedding junta rule but concerns over the pace of democratic reforms are expected to surface at the two-day event featuring US President Barack Obama.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) and East Asia summits, held in the purpose-built capital of Naypyidaw, are the culmination of a year of diplomatic limelight for Myanmar after long decades shunted to the sidelines under its former military rulers.
Other key issues will include the row between several Asean members and China over territory in the South China Sea, and greater economic integration ahead of a Southeast Asian trade union mooted for 2015.
At the end of the Asean summit yesterday, the leaders were expected to release a statement expressing “concerns over recent developments in the South China Sea, which have increased tensions in the area”, according to a draft.
China says most of the South China Sea — including areas near the coast of rival claimants — is its territory.
The sea row has dogged regional relations for years, with Beijing reluctant to sign a binding, multilateral code of conduct covering disputes in the resource-rich waters.
A spokesman for Philippine President Benigno Aquino said Asean leaders yesterday again called for “a substantial fleshing out” of the process towards reaching the elusive code.
In the draft statement, the leaders also pledged to take “all necessary measures” to stop Asean nationals “travelling to join terrorist groups.”
Scores, possibly even hundreds, of people from Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim country, and Malaysia have joined Islamic militants in Syria and Iraq.
Asean leaders are due to meet Chinese Premier Li Keqiang today during the East Asia Summit, which groups the Southeast Asian bloc with the United States, China, India, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Russia and New Zealand.
In remarks to open the Asean summit, Myanmar’s reform-minded President Thein Sein hailed progress on the reduction of trade barriers and tariffs with the goal of a 2015 economic integration fast approaching.
Yesterday, the bloc held meetings with India and Japan before Obama landed in the evening fresh from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Beijing.
Obama is set to meet Thein Sein and opposition leader — and fellow Nobel laureate — Aung San Suu Kyi during his two-night stay in the country, as he throws his political muscle behind reforms and landmark elections slated for late 2015.
Myanmar, which was swept into the diplomatic hinterland under decades of harsh military rule, has been welcomed back into the international fold after the release of most political prisoners and the promise of free and fair polls next year. AFP
NAYPYIDAW: US President Barack Obama expressed concerns ahead of a visit to Myanmar starting yesterday that the pace of democratic reforms in the formerly military-ruled nation were not fast enough.
“Progress has not come as fast as many had hoped when the transition began four years ago,” Obama said in an interview with The Irrawaddy published on its website yesterday.
“In some areas there has been a slowdown in reforms, and even some steps backward.
“In addition to restrictions on freedom of the press, we continue to see violations of basic human rights and abuses in the country’s ethnic areas, including reports of extrajudicial killings, rape and forced labour,” he added.
His comments follow a warning by opposition leader and democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi against US “over-optimism” over the country’s path towards democracy.
Last week she said reforms had been “stalling” for almost two years.
The US president highlighted several examples where reforms appear to have been stunted.
“Former political prisoners continue to face restrictions,” he said in the interview.
“Members of the media have been arrested, and journalist Aung Kyaw Naing was tragically and senselessly murdered,” he added, referring to the fatal shooting by the army of a reporter in the insurgency-prone eastern border region.
AFP
