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View all search resultsWhere is Prabowo the peacemaker?
Not only does Indonesia have the experience and the diplomatic skills to serve as peace mediators, we also understand the region and the people much better.
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This handout photo taken and released by Agence Kampuchea Press (AKP) on Dec. 13 shows smoke rising following a blast in Pursat province in Cambodia amid clashes along the Cambodia-Thailand border. The latest clashes between the Southeast Asian neighbors, stemming from a long-running dispute over the colonial-era demarcation of their 800-kilometer border, have displaced around half a million on both sides. (AFP/Handout/Agence Kampuchea Press (AKP))
T
he renewed clashes between Thailand and Cambodia along their common border this past week has again exposed ASEAN’s impotence when it comes to dealing with serious threats to the peace and stability of Southeast Asia.
While the regional organization may not be designed to deal with wars between members, it should not stop Indonesia, as the largest country in the region, from intervening and restoring peace outside the ASEAN mechanism.
The only initiative to try to stop the war so far has come from United States President Donald Trump. But like many of the wars Trump claimed to have resolved, this one too is made more for stealing the media spotlight, without changing the situation on the ground.
Like the truce he secured in July when the first round of clashes erupted, anything he pulls off now will not likely last. On Saturday, Thailand vowed to continue its military operation along the border hours after Trump’s announcement that he had brokered a new ceasefire.
It is an irony that ASEAN has always bragged that peace and stability in the region have allowed member countries to focus on development to bring prosperity to their people for much of the last 50 years, yet it has no effective mechanism when members fight one another. The ASEAN High Council is designed more as resolution mechanism for trade and economic disputes while political and territorial disputes have been resolved bilaterally.
This is a second recent major let down from ASEAN, having failed to stop the civil war in Myanmar.
At least, ASEAN gave it a try when the war broke out in February 2021, with Jakarta hosting an emergency summit that included a representative of the Myanmar junta which had just seized power from the elected civilian government. Mindful of the challenge facing ASEAN, then Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi, declared “to do nothing is not an option”.
