Twenty-third ASEAN Summit wraps up in Brunei

During the summit and related meetings, ASEAN leaders focused their discussions on the formation of an ASEAN Community which is scheduled to be completed by 2015.

They voiced support for building ASEAN's post-2015 vision and agreed to boost regional linkage and connectivity and further deepen relations between the ten-member group and its partners while promoting the bloc's central role and enhancing its contributions to peace, stability and development in the region.

ASEAN and its partners touched upon and proposed a range of practical measures in order to promote peace, stability, security and development co-operation in the region.

They unanimously agreed to continue prioritising co-operation in economics, trade, investment, natural disaster management, culture and education, and narrowing development gap.

They will work more closely with each other to handle non-traditional security challenges such as energy and food security, epidemics and climate change.

The leaders also devoted much time to deliberating regional and international issues of mutual concern, including the East Sea question.

They stressed the significance of the maintenance of peace, security and stability in the region as well as the East Sea, the peaceful settlement of disputes, the observance of international law and the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law on the Sea, the full and efficient implementation of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea, and the early achievement of a Code of Conduct in the East Sea.

At the end of the meetings, ASEAN leaders and their partners approved a spate of important documents, including the Declaration on the ASEAN Community's Post-2015 Vision, the Declaration on Youth Entrepreneurship and Employment, the Declaration on Strengthening Social Protection, the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Elimination of Violence Against Children, the Declaration on Enhancing Co-operation in Disaster Management, the Declaration on Non-communicable Diseases and the Declaration on the 8th East Asia Summit on Food Security.

At the closing ceremony, Brunei handed over the ASEAN Chair in 2014 to Myanmar.

The same day, the fifth ASEAN-UN Summit was convened, seeing ASEAN and UN leaders agreeing to continue implementing the ASEAN-UN Joint Declaration on a Comprehensive Partnership and boost co-operation in various areas such as maritime security and safety, food and energy security and climate change, and Millennium Development Goals implementation.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung delivered a speech at the Summit, emphasising on the need for the two sides to step up the implementation of commitments they reached, especially in prioritised areas of mutual concern.

He called on the UN to closely partner with and help ASEAN countries fulfil the UN Millennium Development Goals.

In terms of regional peace and security, PM Dung proposed the UN strongly back up ASEAN's principles on the East Sea issue as stated in the Declaration on Six-point Principles on the East Sea issued in July last year.

Vietnam will soon take part in UN peacekeeping missions, firstly in engineering, army medicine and military observance, for peace, stability and development in the region and the world at large, he affirmed.

(Source: Nhandannewspaperonline)