The chairmanship of ASEAN rotates annually in alphabetical order, and the clock usually starts ticking from the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Retreat. Following this practice, 10 ASEAN foreign ministers gathered in Nha Trang, Vietnam, on Jan. 16 to 17. Just before the retreat, Vietnam officially launched its 2020 ASEAN chairmanship with a theme “Cohesive and Responsive ASEAN”.In his speech on Vietnam’s 2020 ASEAN chairmanship on Jan. 6, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc laid out five priorities for implementing this theme. First was ASEAN’s active role and contribution to maintaining regional peace and stability; he also emphasized the importance of strengthening ASEAN’s unity as well as cooperation among the ASEAN member states.Ever-increasing regional and external uncertainties arousing from the rivalry between global powers seem to have led to ASEAN’s need to strengthen its uni...