By Design or Accident: Reflections on Asian Security

8. Surprising, Squabbling, Peaceful ASEAN

8 Surprising, Squabbling, Peaceful ASEAN The picture of unity among the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been somewhat spoilt in recent months by bilateral spats between members. Singapore and Malaysia argue over water, Malaysia offended Indonesia and the Philippines with the way its police expelled illegal Indonesian and Filipino migrants. Thailand and Myanmar continue to have border disputes. Observers unacquainted withASEAN ask if such public squabbling damagesASEAN. They are surprised when they find that the answer is: not much. Conceived in the throes of Cold War conflict, ASEAN has traditionally sought to avoid being held hostage to the bilateral quarrels of its members. Rather, its attitude has been to seek and advance areas of common interest despite the existence of bilateral problems. Without this approach, the grouping of developing nations would not have been able to progress. Consider for instance the fact that key members of ASEAN had been at war, near war or suffering from the trauma of separation (in the case of Singapore and Malaysia) only a few years before the organisation was established in 1967. It was necessary to stay clear of the 32 By Design or Accident legacy of bilateral bitterness and to focus instead on shared interests. Bilateral problems between member states have occurred throughout ASEAN’s history. They have included, just to mention a few, the Philippines-Malaysia dispute over Sabah; Indonesian claims to the Malaysian islands of Sipadan and Ligitan; the fracas between Singapore and the Philippines over the execution here of Filipina maid Flor Contemplacion; and the Malaysian-Singapore row over the state visit of Israeli president Herzog to Singapore. These rows did not prevent ASEAN from making remarkableadvancesinregionalcooperationandprogressively enhancing its international stature from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s. Indeed, the regional framework provided by ASEAN with its vast networking and commitments through formal agreements and informal understandings in many areas has served to contain bilateral disputes. The ASEAN financial and economic crisis in 1997–98 left in its wake economic wreckage and political instability. Indeed, the worst period in this respect was 1998–99 when several bilateral relationships were strained simultaneously — between Singapore and Malaysia and the Philippines. Yet the numerous ASEAN meetings continued, not just with a “business as usual” attitude but with even more focus, in an effort to find a way out of the problems afflicting the members. It was during these difficult years thatASEAN developed important new initiatives like theASEAN Plus Three process involving theASEAN countries together with China, Japan and South Korea. From 1999, it also focused attention on helping Surprising, Squabbing, Peaceful ASEAN 33 the four newASEAN members — Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam — to integrate into the regional body. Thus troubled bilateral relationships do not necessarily mean trouble across the board. Cooperation usually continues in other areas. The good relationship between the defence forces of Indonesia and Singapore has remained unaffected by the ups and downs in the political relationship since 1998. And behind the apparent tensions in Singapore-Malaysia relations, cooperation between police and intelligence services on crime and terrorism has continued. However, if bilateral squabbles and the way they are handled have so far not been central to ASEAN’s fortunes, they should not be viewed as irrelevant either. It cannot be denied that the quarrels of recent years, characterized as they sometimes have been by a certain stridency of nationalism and seeming carelessness about its possible consequences, did add to the adverse perceptions of ASEAN abroad. Before the mid-1990s, when ASEAN basked in the glory of its achievements and its international stature, the ‘cushion’ that allowed it to get away with ill-managed bilateral quarrels was much bigger than it is today. ASEAN countries need to bear this in mind as the group seeks to recover its international credibility. It should be borne in mind that although ASEAN as an organization has not wanted to be involved in the bilateral disputes of its members, it has from the beginning placed high premium on the need for members to resolve or manage them with care and sensitivity. Hence, more care given by members to the management of bilateral problems in accordance with the norms and spirit of ASEAN will not be amiss. 34 By Design or Accident Note This article was first published in The Straits Times, 16 September 2002. Reprinted with permission of The Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Limited. ...