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View all search resultsASEAN at 59, time to deliver
As the Association of Southeast Asian Nations turns 59, it should use the occasion to reflect on both its past progress and current challenges to determine future delivery in view of its diamond jubilee next year.
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Stagehands arrange microphones on May 8, 2026, prior to the opening ceremony for the 48th ASEAN Summit in Cebu, the Philippines. (AFP/Pool/Aaron Favila)
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stablished in Bangkok on Aug. 8, 1967, the 11-member ASEAN celebrates its 59th anniversary today. It is the right moment to reflect on the past and confront, with honesty, the obstacles that stand in the way of progress, especially in light of next year’s diamond jubilee.
For this commemoration, member states should recall the reasons the founders decided to work together. This also applies to Indonesia, which has a tendency to see itself as somewhat above ASEAN and desires to play a larger role befitting a key middle power.
Several challenges the grouping is unlikely to overcome anytime soon include the Myanmar crisis, the Thailand-Cambodia border dispute and slow progress on the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).
On Myanmar, the junta’s one concrete action on the Five-Point Consensus it agreed five years ago has been to allow Aung San Suu Kyi, now 81, to meet Red Cross resident representative Arnaud de Baecque in Naypyitaw on Aug. 3.
How can ASEAN be expected to show more flexibility toward Myanmar’s government when it offers no meaningful proof of its own commitments? One supervised meeting with a Red Cross official is a far cry from the ceasefire and dialogue among the points agreed in 2021.
The Thai-Cambodian dispute will haunt ASEAN for a long time, given the highly emotional nature of the historical conflict and that both governments are tempted to use it to boost domestic popularity.
Cambodia actually has the diplomatic upper hand: The International Court of Justice ruled in 1962 that Preah Vihear temple, which is at the heart of the current escalation, belonged to Cambodia, reaffirming the verdict in 2013. Thailand has rejected this ruling.
