ASEAN Future Challenges and the Importance of an ASEAN CharterJusuf Wanandi

ASIEN – Nr. 100 (2006) pp. 85–87

At the last ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur December 2005, it has been agreed that an ASEAN Charter is of utmost importance to be able to face new and future challenges. For that purpose an Eminent Persons Group (EPG) has been established. ASEAN ISIS (Institutes for Strategic and International Studies) have proposed a Memorandum to be considered by the EPG last April, when they met for the third time in Bali. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is now facing, and will face in the future, the greatest challenges of its 40 years of existence. This is why ASEAN must be strengthened and its cooperation deepened. For that purpose a charter, as envisaged by its leaders at the last summit in Kuala Lumpur, is a critical start. In the beginning ASEAN also faced some big challenges…