PHNOM PENH: At the rate China is reaching out to Southeast Asia in the past few days, it could well emerge as the ‘big brother’ to whom the region’s countries look to in economic development.
As of Monday, Beijing and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have signed four agreements — one on a free trade agreement, cooperation in new areas like drug trafficking, agricultural cooperation and a landmark declaration on territorial disputes in the South China Sea.
Through these accords, China has gone ahead of rival Japan — which Southeast Asian countries have traditionally followed in the flying-geese pattern of economic development — in setting the stage for healthy economic and political ties with the region.
Two of the four agreements are particularly significant. Cambodian diplomat Dr Chem Widhya called the free trade agreement the economic pillar of ASEAN-China ties, and the South China Sea declaration their political pillar.
China’s deputy foreign minister Wang Yi says that, China and ASEAN are seeking “common security” in their ties. “The common security that China and ASEAN are after is a new concept and a modality of security that is a clean break from Cold War models of security,” he told newsmen on Monday.
He said the China-ASEAN free trade area, proposed by Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji last year and signed by Beijing and ASEAN at their leaders’ meeting here on Monday, was but a “practical” move to ensure that East Asia keeps up with other regions’ pace of integration.
As for the declaration on the South China Sea, which stresses a desire to prevent further tensions over territorial disputes over the resource-rich Spratley islands, he said: “The deal actually symbolizes new progress in China’s relations with ASEAN. It also signals a new level trust between the two parties.”
In the economic sphere, a Filipino diplomat says, it is clear that “China wants to be the dominant economic player in the region”. Media reports in Thailand called Beijing’s moves at the 8th ASEAN summit here a “grand slam win”.
The agreement on economic cooperation signed by China and ASEAN on Monday, which will come into force on July 1 next year, would cover 1.7 billion consumers and two-way trade of 1.2 trillion dollars. China and ASEAN together would make the world’s biggest free trade area.
The free trade agreement will eliminate tariffs and non-tariff barriers to goods and services, but give special and differential treatment and flexibility to newer ASEAN member states like Cambodia, Laos, Burma and Vietnam.
China also decided to help Cambodia by writing off its debt, said to be around $200 million.
China and the six original ASEAN states are to be in the free trade area by 2010. The less developed members of Cambodia, Laos, Burma and Vietnam would follow by 2015.
The China-ASEAN free trade area is designed to soothe Southeast Asia’s worries about being edged out after China’s entry into the World Trade Organisation late last year.—Dawn/The InterPress News Service.