Newly-reelected United States President Barrack Obama will attend the
21st Association of the Southeast Asian Nations Summit as part of the US’
policy to re-assert its presence in the region.
Obama will be making his first
foreign trip following his re-election, as part of his pursuit of becoming the
“first Pacific President of the United States.”
Obama’s visit, according to
observers, was also a key part of his strategy to expand American imports in
competition with China, the world’s second largest economy.
Obama is also scheduled to meet
President Tehin Sein and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyii in Yangon, Myanmar
to underscore US efforts in encouraging greater political freedom in that
country, before stopping by Thailand, where he is slated to meet with Prime
Minister Yingluck Shinawatra in Bangkok.
The Asean Summit will be held on
Nov. 15-20 at the Peace Palace Phnom Penh, Cambodia, which earlier hosted the
45th Foreign Ministers Meeting as part of its duty as ASEAN chair.
President Benigno Aquino III is
also scheduled to attend the summit, where he will be joined by heads of states
and governments of Asean members Brunei
Darussalam, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Vietnam and
Thailan.
Aside from Obama, other heads of
states outside of the Asean who are expected to grace the event are Chinese
Premier Wen Jiabao and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, and possibly
Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Foreign Affairs spokesman Raul
Hernandez said that the Mr. Aquino’s agenda and scheduled bilateral meetings
with other heads of state will be announced on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, several women’s groups
gathered in front of the DFA and the Embassy of Cambodia to call on the
governments of the Philippines and Cambodia to reflect the genuine concerns of
women in the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration, which is one of several topics to
be tackled during the summit.
At the same time, the women’s
groups, along with other human rights advocates expressed their dismay over
what they claimed as the haphazard process of adopting the AHRD.
The women’s groups had earlier
called for the postponement of the declaration pending a wider consultation
process, but the ASEAN appeared bent on
adopting the AHRD during the ASEAN Summit.
The protests were held under the
banner of Philwomen, a network of around
80 organizations that promote women’s rights and gender equality in the ASEAN.
They claimed that women’s
concerns have been “glaringly ignored” in the AHRD.
Philwomen earlier said that it
wanted to integrate in the AHRD issues
such as access to justice, violence against women, sexual and reproductive
health and rights, and migration.
Also on Friday, Philwomen
officials went to the office of Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert Del Rosario to
hand their position paper on the AHRD entitled, “A Challenge to Asean: Be at
the Forefront of Human Rights Building in Southeast Asia.”
The group challenged the Asean to
“raise the bar” in developing a progressive AHRD and putting in place
mechanisms in the Asean for human rights promotion and protection.
Philwomen demanded that the
Philippine and Cambodia governments enjoin the Asean member states in ensuring
that the Declaration will not retreat from the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights standard of universality and non-discrimination.
“The Asean must continue to
uphold that all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights”,
the group said.
“Access to justice should be at
the core of the declaration”, said Jelen Paclarin of Women’s Legal and Human
Rights Bureau.
“Access to justice leads to the
creation of mechanisms that provide redress and remedies for human rights
violations suffered by peoples, especially women in the region. Access to
justice is the ‘teeth’ of the AHRD that will pave the way to a strong,
independent, credible and effective regional human rights system in the Asean,”
she added.
Sara Susanne D. Fabunan
Business & Investment Opportunities
YourVietnamExpert is a division of Saigon Business Corporation Pte Ltd, Incorporated in Singapore since 1994. As Your Business Companion, we propose a range of services in Strategy, Investment and Management, focusing Healthcare and Life Science with expertise in ASEAN. Since we are currently changing the platform of www.yourvietnamexpert.com, you may contact us at: sbc.pte@gmail.com, provisionally. Many thanks.
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