South China Sea: Asean risks irrelevance from 'damaging' non-response to tensions

Perennially labelled as an ineffectual talkshop, the Asean summit will be under added scrutiny this week following a rise in Chinese assertiveness in the South China Sea that observers say the grouping must speak up against or risk further derision.

Opening the Asean summit on Tuesday, Indonesia's President Joko Widodo warned that the 56-year-old bloc should not be dragged into big-power rivalry, but said members should devise a "long-term tactical strategy that is relevant and meets people's expectations".

"Asean has agreed to not be a proxy to any powers. Don't turn our ship into an arena for rivalry that is destructive," Widodo said.

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Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said the bloc had to avoid being passive in dealing with difficult issues.

"Otherwise, Asean will lose its relevance. We have to be prepared to engage all sides actively, in mutually beneficial ways," he said.

Last month, Chinese coastguard ships blocked and fired water cannons at Philippine vessels on a resupply mission to troops deployed on the BRP Sierra Madre vessel in the disputed Spratly Islands.

Then last week, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and Indonesia rejected as baseless a map released by China that denoted its claims to sovereignty over 90 per cent of the South China Sea.

Manila on Thursday called on Beijing "to act responsibly and abide by its obligations" under international law and a 2016 arbitral ruling that declared its claim had no legal grounds, while Malaysia said it had filed a diplomatic protest over the map.

Sharon Seah, senior fellow and coordinator at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute's Asean Studies Centre in Singapore, said if the bloc did not issue a statement on the South China Sea, it would show itself to be irrelevant to its own members.

"Indonesia is trying hard to assert 'Asean centrality' and the chairmanship theme is 'Asean Matters', hence it will be a huge miss if Asean cannot even issue a statement, at the very least to call for the upholding of international law," said Seah, referring to a central tenet of the bloc that it must be the dominant regional platform to overcome common challenges and engage with external powers.

"A non-response is not an option at this point."

Seah added that calling for expediting negotiations for a Code of Conduct (CoC) "will simply be a way of paying lip service to Asean non-performance".

Discussions on the CoC began in 2002, but progress has been slow and both sides have already missed a 2022 deadline to reach an agreement over differences ranging from the geographical scope to a dispute resolution mechanism, and whether the CoC is legally binding.

Seah noted that while members without direct stakes in the South China Sea could choose to keep silent, "not speaking up for adherence to international law will be damaging for everyone" in the long run.

Hunter Marston, a Southeast Asia researcher at the Australian National University, said one reason Asean had not yet taken a stronger and more unified stance was because certain non-claimant states such as Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar had no interest "in sticking their necks out".

This, he said, would allow these countries to "score easy points with China by not pushing the issue" while claimant states preferring a tougher stance were in the minority.

"Another reason is that those who would like to see a tougher stance, such as Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, have their own conflicting claims. Resolving them first would facilitate a stronger, unified position, but this appears unlikely in the near term," Marston said.

Noting that the ball was in Asean's court, Hanh Nguyen, a PhD researcher at the Australian National University and research fellow at the Yokosuka Council on Asia Pacific Studies in Japan, said the bloc must decide how to respond.

"A strong condemnation in the joint statement will demonstrate potential shifts in how the region collectively perceives China," Hanh said, adding that this would involve "a lot of debates and bargaining" among Asean members.

Hanh said Beijing's recent "aggressive actions" in the South China Sea were meant to send a "warning" to both Vietnam and the Philippines over their growing ties with the United States.

During US President Joe Biden's visit to Vietnam this weekend, Hanoi and Washington are expected to elevate their diplomatic relations in an apparent bid to counter China's growing influence.

Ahead of the visit, China's foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning called on the US to "abandon the Cold War mentality" and not "undermine regional peace, stability, development and prosperity".

On Sunday, Brunei issued a statement reiterating its commitment to maintaining peace, stability and security in the South China Sea.

The statement said it was essential that questions of maritime delimitation be agreed upon in accordance with provisions and procedures under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Describing the statement as "hedging", Hanh said Brunei supported addressing the issues bilaterally - China's preferred method for negotiations in the contested waterway - while other claimants supported internationalising disputes.

"At the same time, Brunei also called for disputes to be addressed in accordance with the provisions and procedures of UNCLOS, signalling that it is interested in a rules-based solution to the dispute," she added.

Along with Widodo, seven other national leaders from the bloc are attending this week's biannual talks, which include various "Asean Plus One" talks with external partners, an "Asean Plus Three" meeting with China, Japan and South Korea, and a broader East Asia Summit that will be attended by representatives of most of the world's major powers.

Thailand's new Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, who was sworn in on Tuesday, was represented by Permanent Secretary for Foreign Affairs Sarun Charoensuwan. Myanmar's ruling generals remain barred from high-level Asean meetings following their 2021 coup and opted not to send a civilian representative.

East Timor, which obtained observer status to the bloc pending full accession, was represented by Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao.

Indonesia, the current Asean chair, will hand over that role - which has significant agenda-setting powers - to Laos next year, in keeping with bloc's convention of annually rotating the chairmanship among members in alphabetic order. However, Asean on Tuesday said Myanmar would not be taking over the rotating leadership of the bloc in 2026 as was scheduled.

This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

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