The 50-page blueprint will give a much-needed legal identity to the 40-year-old organisation. Until now action has been voluntary and based on goodwill, and nothing is legally binding.

The Eminent Persons Group (EPG) on the Asean Charter prepared the blueprint. It said members should be punished if they failed to comply with Asean regulations or implement agreed policies.

Bloc foreign ministers gathered in the Philippines agreed to recommend Asean leaders support the blueprint as a whole. The ministers recommended against a "pick and choose" approach.

But, according to informed sources, the Philippines wants to introduce new elements that the EPG has identified as benchmarks for the future of Asean and include them in the Cebu Declaration issued at the end of the summit.

These include a new decision-making process, the application of sanctions and restructuring the Asean secretariat.

"Asean foreign ministers agreed to endorse the EPG report as a package as some of them were not happy with the host's idea," said a source.

The new ideas include a voting system if consensus cannot be reached and the so-called "Asean minus X formula", or "Two plus X."

The EPG recommends voting can be by either a simple, two-thirds or three-quarters majority.

Over the past two decades, Asean cooperation issues or projects have seen "flexible participation" of members. This concept will be expanded to cover political cooperation, informed sources said.

"Some new members are very sensitive to a new decision-making process that goes beyond a consensus because they view it as direct pressure and interference," said the same source.

It is an open secret that new members, including Burma and Laos, have reservations about a voting system, fearing they could be isolated.

If the proposals are approved, Asean punitive action for serious breaches of bloc objectives by members will for the first time include suspension. Expulsion would be by the new Asean Council vote only.

The EPG reviewed Asean achievements and shortcomings over the past year. It explored ways to strengthen the grouping and ready it to meet the 21st century's challenges.

It is confident Asean is moving in the right direction.

"Asean has the potential to achieve greater success and the Asean Charter will serve as the legal basis and institutional framework for this purpose," said the EPG letter to the Asean leaders.

The EPG was set up in December 2005 in Kuala Lumpur to examine Asean and provide practical recommendations on its direction and the nature of the Asean Charter.

Other EPG recommendations include making the Asean Council the supreme decision-making body, comprising all Asean leaders and meeting twice a year.

The group wants to see dispute-settlement mechanisms apply punitive sanctions.

Its report calls for a full-time Asean Permanent Representative, based on the European Community model.

The representative would be in Jakarta.

The 10-member EPG includes Brunei Foreign and Trade Minister Lim Jock Sen, Cambodian prime-ministerial economic adviser Dr Aun Porn Moniroth, former Indonesian foreign minister Ali Alatas, Laos' former deputy commerce minister Khamphan Simmalavong, and former Malaysian deputy prime minister Musa Hitam.

Former Philippine president Fidel Ramos is a member along with Burma's Civil Service Selection and Training Board chairman Than Nyun, Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Prof Shunmugam Jayakumar, Thailand's former foreign minister MR Kasem S Kasemsri, and Vietnam's former deputy prime minister Nguyen Manh Cam.

The High Level Task Force for an Asean Charter was established last month. It will write the document over the coming 10 months. It is hoped the charter will be signed at the next summit in Singapore in November.

Kavi Chongkittavorn

The Nation