Thai premier calls for action-based ASEAN (1st Lead)

Phuket, Thailand - The Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) needs to become an action-based community, Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva urged Monday at the opening of an annual meeting of the region's foreign ministers. 'The ASEAN community must be a community of action,' Abhisit said in his opening speech to the 42nd ASEAN foreign ministers' meeting held this week in Phuket, 600 kilometres south of Bangkok. 'We need to show the world that ASEAN is ready to meet any challenge.' Monday through Thursday foreign ministers from the 10 ASEAN states and their 15 main dialogue partners meet in Phuket to discuss a variety of security and social challenges to the region. On Monday the South-East Asian top diplomats were expected to endorse the terms of reference for an ASEAN Inter-Governmental Commission on Human Rights which will be launched at the upcoming 15th ASEAN Summit in October, also to be held in Phuket. ASEAN, which includes the pariah state Myanmar, has had a poor record in enforcing human rights protection in its region and the planned commission has already been labelled a 'toothless tiger.' The commission will have a very weak mandate, limited at first to promoting the concept of human rights and engaging with civil society, but will be subject to amendments every five years. 'It is better to make a start than to leave this hanging with no progress at all,' Abhisit told a press conference. The human rights commission's terms of reference will include provisions for significant amendments every five years, giving some hope that it will gain teeth with age. 'We want to establish a body that begins with the issue of promotion (of human rights), and once that is put in place then there will be more teeth in the body for protection,' Abhsit said. The foreign ministers will also discuss a host of regional challenges including the economic crisis, global warming and the new threat of the H1N1 swine-flu virus. On Tuesday the ministers are to meet with their Asian dialogue partners from China, Japan and South Korea, with energy and food security likely to be the main topics of discussion. Wednesday there will be more bilateral talks with the members of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), Asia's main security event. US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is scheduled to sign the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in South-East Asia (TAC), making the US one of the last ASEAN allies to do so. Under the presidency George W Bush Washington refused to sign the TAC, a loose treaty defining the terms of conduct on diplomacy and security issues in Asia. President Barack Obama has indicated a change in the US approach in Asia, attaching more importance to multilateral groupings such as ASEAN rather than pursuing Bush's bilateral diplomacy. 'We are pleased with the US foreign policy which clearly attaches more importance to this region as a whole,' Abhisit said. 'I think this accession to the TAC is a reflection of that.' The European Union is expected to join TAC at the October summit. The ARF is to meet Thursday to discuss regional security threats such as North Korea's nuclear weapons programme and Myanmar's ongoing political stalemate. The ARF includes the 10 ASEAN members as well as Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, China, India, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Mongolia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Russia, Sri Lanka, the US and the EU, with Papua New Guinea and East Timor as observers. The North Korean foreign minister is not expected to attend the meeting. Phuket has been chosen for this week's meetings and the summit because the island is deemed easier to provide security for than Bangkok or other cities. Anti-government protestors invaded the venue of a summit between ASEAN and China, Japan and South Korea in the beach resort town Pattaya on April 11-12, scuttling the event much to Thailand's embarrassment.