SINGAPORE: US President Barack Obama and leaders from ASEAN have discussed the importance of putting mechanisms and processes in place to peacefully manage disputes over the competing claims in the South China Sea.
Following the 4th ASEAN-US leaders meeting on Monday night, the White House issued a statement on its government website.
President Obama's press secretary said that both the US and ASEAN leaders expressed support for the ASEAN Foreign Ministers' Statement on "Six-Point Principles on the South China Sea" and called for an "early conclusion" of a regional code of conduct.
The United States also announced the creation of the Expanded ASEAN Seafarer's Training (EAST) programme to improve counter-piracy training and education in the region.
President Obama noted that the ASEAN region was home to over half of the world's seafaring workers and the programme, administered by the US Department of Transportation's Maritime Administration, will be expanded from its current pilot phase working with the Philippines.
Meanwhile, to further enhance cooperation when confronting the challenge of piracy, the United States announced its intention to join the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against ships in Asia (ReCAAP).
ReCAAP is a regional multilateral agreement between 18 countries to facilitate the dissemination of piracy-related information.
Tuesday is the final day of the ASEAN Summit in Phnom Penh and the focus of the leaders will be the East Asia Summit, which will see ASEAN and its dialogue partners discuss political, economic and security issues affecting the Asia-Pacific region.
ASEAN leaders will also be launching the discussions for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which is a 16-party Free Trade Agreement between the 10-member ASEAN grouping and its current FTA Partners of Australia, China, India, Japan, Korea and New Zealand.
The negotiations for the RCEP are expected to start in 2013 and conclude by end-2015.
ASEAN's leaders believe that the RCEP would lead to greater economic integration, support equitable economic development and strengthen economic co-operation among the countries involved, especially when it has a potential to transform the region into an integrated market of more than three billion people, with a combined GDP of about US$17.23 trillion.
Singapore is taking part in the RCEP as it enhances access to a huge potential market that will bring benefits to both businesses and consumers in the participating countries. Singapore is also a strong proponent of free trade and the RCEP involves many of the Republic's biggest trading partners.
Also taking pace as part of the summit is the ASEAN Global Dialogue, an initiative by Cambodia. It brings together leaders from several global agencies to discuss the role of multilateral institutions, ASEAN and East Asia in addressing economic and financial disorder.
Institutions involved in the dialogue include the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the World Trade Organization (WTO), and the World Bank.
-CNA/ac
ASEAN, US leaders discuss need to peacefully manage South China Sea disputes
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ASEAN, US leaders discuss need to peacefully manage South China Sea disputes
