Current Security and Political Challenges in Asia

Moderator: Karel Kovanda

Participants: Yohei Sasakawa, Surin Pitsuwan, Prince Norodom Sirivudh, Toshimitsu Shigemura, Harsha Kumara Navaratne

 

 

 

While the rest of the world is facing a financial crisis, “Asia is leading the way out of recession”, highlighted the growing prosperity of Asia Yohei Sasakawa, Chairman of The Nippon Foundation and one of the founders of the Forum 2000 in his opening speech. Asia’s diversity, which represents its potential, also brings with it many challenges that can only be dealt with across country borders. He outlined some of the ways in which The Nippon Foundation contributes, for example by improving maritime security in strait of Malacca.

 

As an intergovernmental body, the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) plays a role in overcoming some of the challenges, in particular by providing an institutional ground for dialogue and confidence building via the ASEAN Regional Forum, added Surin Pitsuwan, the Secretary General of ASEAN. Prince Norodom Sirivudh from the Cambodian Institute for Cooperation and Peace, however, drew attention to the need for developing mechanisms for addressing non-traditional security issues including epidemics, natural disasters and food security.

 

Surin Pitsuwan also referred to the dangers of populism and authoritarianism as ways of dealing with globalization; he suggested that East Asia has to look for a way of how not to “sacrifice our rights, our freedoms and our democracy just for material and economic progress”. He introduced ASEAN’s Initiative for Financial Stability, which would benefit East Asia by allowing it to play a more active economic role, independent on Western demand.

 

Toshimitsu Shigemura, Professor of International Relations at Waseda University, reflected on the reasons why communist ideology is so persistent in Asia, attributing this to deeply rooted Confuciust principles of centralization, absolute loyalty or obedience to the leader. He added that a sense of fear is “the main cause of China’s growing military power and North Korea’s nuclear development”, ending with the idea that when South and North Korea become one entity, like post-Communist Germany, North Korean nuclear development will come to a halt.

 

Prince Norodom Sirivudh asserted that security and stability of Asia is based on an overall balance of power in the region, also shaped by US-Chinese relations, which are beneficial to the region as they are. He stressed the importance of the regional forum and of ASEAN nations balancing with the countries of North Korean, Japan and China.

 

Speaking of China’s role, Surin Pitsuwan stated that “all of us have [in ASEAN] benefited from the rise of China economically, and I’m rather confident that politically, China will become more responsible to ensure that the region is calm and stable.”

 

Harsha Kumara Navaratne, Chairman of the Sewalanka Foundation of Sri Lanka, spoke about the dichotomy of Sri Lanka as a nation based on Buddhist and Hindu principles of nonviolence and consumed by violence at the same time. The reasons for this lie in the loss of those values the nation was founded upon, becoming instead a society where politicians divide the country for profit all in the name of democracy. He called on the international community not to push Sri Lanka “against the wall”, because if the government feels threatened, it will “hide behind friends who do not know what democracy is.”