ASEAN Regional Forum
The ARF was established in 1994 and brings together 23 countries, which have an impact on or are involved in the security of the Asia Pacific region. It comprises the 10 ASEAN member states (Brunei, Myanmar, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam); the 10 ASEAN dialogue partners (Australia, Canada, China, the EU, India, Japan, New Zealand, Republic of Korea, Russia and the United States), the one ASEAN observer (Papua New Guinea); as well as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and Mongolia.
The ARF is created to discuss Asian regional security issues, whereby the inclusion of the big powers in the region was rather important. The ARF is the most important multilateral forum on security issues in Asia. It is a valuable tool to promote stable relations between the major powers and forms an important complement to the various bilateral alliances and dialogues, which underpin the region's security architecture.
The ARF follows the approach stemming from the ASEAN experience, namely that an incremental process of dialogue can lead to qualitative improvements in political relationships.
It provides a setting in which members can discuss current regional security issues and develop cooperative measures to enhance peace and security in the region. For instance, issues, which are recently under discussion, concern the security, political and human rights situations in the Korean Peninsula, Indonesia, MyanmarŠ; the instability in the Pacific; nuclear testing in South Asia; weapons of mass destruction and missile issues; transnational crimes such as piracy, people smuggling, illicit trade in small armsŠ. .
The participating states are encouraged to provide voluntary briefings on issues like defence policy and spending, as a means of enhancing transparency and building confidence.
ASEAN was not only active in the realm of security, but made progress as well in the economic domain. As already indicated, ASEAN was in the first place designed to foster peaceful relations between its members, and to enable them to focus their resources on internal economic development, whereby their growing prosperity would demean the communist appeal. However, economic cooperation, let alone integration, was less important than the political objectives. Besides, the disparity in levels of economic development between the member states proved to be insurmountable to achieve deeper forms of economic cooperation. But times were changing. The recession in Southeast Asia in 1985-86 induced several ASEAN member states to a shift of power away from economic nationalists to liberal reformers. This in combination with the aftermath of the Plaza Accord, which led to a massive appreciation of the Japanese yen and an enormous increase in the volume of Japanese FDI in Southeast Asia, enabled Japan to use its leverage over the ASEAN states and to push them into the liberalization direction, and the economic rise of China, a serious competitor for ASEAN states in low-cost manufactured goods and as location for FDI, provided the necessary impetus for ASEAN to make headway with an ASEAN Free Trade Area.
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