Asean endorses its charter

 Prior to the signing ceremony at the 13th summit in Singapore, leaders of the ten governments were in tension as Burma's Prime Minister Thein Sein opposed an idea proposed by host Singapore to bring the United Nations special envoy Ibrahim Gambari into briefings to the Asean summit and East Asia Summit.

The leaders turned a joyful reception dinner late Monday night into a serious meeting that ended up with a chairman statement to urge Burma to continue cooperation with the UN and open up a meaningful dialogue with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi for national reconciliation.

"Most leaders expressed the view that Myanmar (Burma) could not go back or stay put. The process of national reconciliation had to move forward, and the UN played a vital role in this process," said Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsein Loong in his chairman statement.

The Asean charter would turn the 40 years old regional grouping into a rule-based organization that would made clear structure and decision making of the group.

It would also give birth to the human right body to promote and protect basic right of Asean citizens but no one in the meeting has clear idea how to put it into the context of current crisis of the trouble Burma.

The military junta launched a bloodshed crackdown to a massive street protest in September that killed, as the government admitted, at least 15 people and detained some 3000 protesters.

The charter would not come into force unless all ten member states ratified it. The ratification process might take at least a year. The human right body, as mentioned in article 14, would not be tangible before a completion of its term of reference. There remained unclear whether the body would have sharp teeth to protect human right.

Along with the charter, the Asean also signed the Declaration of the Asean Economic Community to have European style of community including common market and production base by 2015.

The Declaration on Environment Sustainability and the Asean Declaration on the 13th Session of Conference pf Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the 3 rd Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol were also inked during the summit.

by Supalak G Khundee

The Nation, Singapore