Will ASEAN Ever Get China to Discuss Sea Disputes?

Once more a two-day summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations ended yesterday, this time in Brunei.

The 10-member Asean’s summit chairman, Brunei’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, who formally hosted the event, as in previous summits issued a statement that voiced the members’ desire for “peace, stability and maritime security in the region” in our region.

He later told reporters in the post summit press conference that the Asean leaders wanted to “urgently work on a code of conduct” with China.

That code of conduct has been the most controversial item in the life of the now venerable association for a decade.

Southeast Asian leaders said this summit revived a sense of unity within Asean on the issue. President Benigno Aquino 3rd praised the Sultan of Brunei for “deft diplomacy that helped build a consensus” (said Agence France Presse.)

“Everybody is interested in having a peaceful resolution and also in voicing . . . concern that there have been increasing disputes,” Aquino told reporters.

Those who know the situation realize, however, that Asean’s calls for China to agree on a legally binding code of conduct for the sea, specially our West Philippine Sea which the world knows as the South China Sea, are likely to lead nowhere.

For Asean began to work on the code before 2002, and then China publicly said it liked such a code and was supposed to be working with Asean on it. The reality, however, is that China has been undermining it and in the last three years has clearly manifested its opposition to it by refusing to discuss it with Asean.

Agence France-Presse quotes an expert, Ian Storey, a senior fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, saying, “China was never enthusiastic about a code of conduct, as it does not want to sign an agreement that will constrain its sovereignty-building activities.”

President Aquino said he was happy that Asean leaders had at least united in trying to ensure the disputes over the South China Sea did not “become bloody.”

“So there is unity of purpose and one can always be hopeful that that will lead to something more concrete,” he said.

Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said Asean foreign ministers would hold talks with China on the issue during a scheduled event in Beijing later this year.

Officials of Asean, however, have said nothing about any meetings among them on the subject.

The South China Sea issue dominated the summit. Some of the Asean members are increasingly concerned over China’s acts of aggression in laying claim to the waters.

China insists on having sovereign rights to nearly all of the South China Sea. It has drawn the so-called nine-line map, practically including the whole West Philippine—including waters clearly belonging to the Philippines and other Asean countries—as Chinese territory. The sea is believed to sit atop huge deposits of oil and gas. It is also home to some of the world’s busiest shipping lanes and richest fishing grounds.

The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei, as well as Taiwan, also claim parts of the sea.

The competing claims have for decades made the area one of Asia’s potential powder kegs for military conflict. China and Vietnam fought battles in 1974 and 1988 for control of islands that left dozens of soldiers dead. China has actually taken islets of the Philippines and turned them into garrisons.

Tensions have risen again in recent years as China has used increasingly aggressive diplomatic and military tactics to assert its authority.

Among the actions that have caused alarm were China’s occupation of our Panatag Shoal. Last month China deployed naval ships to within 80 kilometers of Malaysia’s coast.

The Asean summit last year became an unpleasant event as the Philippines and Vietnam failed to persuade their fellow members to united behind a message of concern to China.

Cambodia, a close China ally that held the rotating chair of Asean in 2012, fought the efforts of the Philippines and Vietnam. It even turned off the sound system when our secretary of foreign affairs was speaking.

Journey toward AEC more positive

The summit’s host, Sultan Bolkiah, and other Southeast Asian leaders are more correctly optimistic about progress having been made in the summit toward the realization of the dreamed of Asean Economic Community. They said the framework of the European Community-like cohesive association is almost finished, with “more than three-quarters of framework agreed upon.”

The Asean Economic Community would be a single market for Southeast Asia and its 600 million people. The target is for this to become a reality by 2015.