T

he government has said that Indonesia would support Timor Leste’s full membership in ASEAN — despite opposition from other countries.

Experts have agreed with the move, saying admitting Timor Leste into the bloc would reflect ASEAN’s maturity and show that ASEAN belongs to all Southeast Asian nations, despite economic differences.

“Geopolitically, geo-economically and geo-socioculturally, the future of Timor Leste will be enmeshed in the future of Southeast Asia in general,” Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said over the weekend after meeting his Timor Leste counterpart, Zacaria Albano da Costa.

“It is our choice to postpone, ignore or manage this from the very beginning. In Indonesia’s case, we choose to manage this from the start. Timor Leste is already part of [our] efforts towards building the ASEAN Community by 2015.”

He said, however, Timor Leste’s fate would not necessarily be decided this year.

Da Costa was in Jakarta to submit Timor Leste’s formal application for full membership in the bloc to Indonesia, ASEAN’s current chair.

Several ASEAN countries reportedly object to Timor Leste’s membership in ASEAN, saying it will hard for the nation to catch up with existing members in time for the ASEAN Community’s launch in 2015.

Some fear that ASEAN’s focus in developing Laos, one of the bloc’s least-developed countries, would shift to Timor Leste.

Marty said that it was not the first time that ASEAN had been challenged to admit a less-developed Southeast Asian nation.

“When ASEAN decided to open itself to admit [Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam], different opinions were also raised,” he said. “But we made a strategic decisions and did not count on very limited documents only.”

ASEAN would discuss how to respond to opposition as Timor Leste’s admission would be achieved only through consensus, Marty added.

Dewi Fortuna Anwar, an ASEAN expert at the Habibie Center, said Singapore’s objection, for example, to Timor Leste’s membership on development grounds, was understandable.

She said Singapore’s gross domestic product per capita was US$30,000 a year, while Laos, the relatively least-developed nation in the bloc, recorded a per capita GDP of $600.

“There’s always a risk that the [integration] process would become more complex when there’s a widening gap. ”

“The geopolitical aspect is something that needs consideration as well, when an island has not well-integrated yet into a region,” she said, adding it would be better for ASEAN to admit Timor Leste into the bloc so there would be a common platform in the region.

ASEAN expert Bantarto Bandoro of Parahyangan University said Indonesia should use the same arguments it made during the Bangkok Declaration, when the bloc decided to accept Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam as full members of ASEAN.