ASEAN diplomatic sources told Kyodo News on
Tuesday that at the 47th ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting scheduled to be held
next month in Myanmar's administrative capital Naypyitaw, the foreign ministers
will touch on territorial disputes in the South China Sea and the East China
Sea.
On the
East China Sea, in particular, one of the sources quoted a draft of the
meeting's joint statement as saying, "We expressed our concerns over the
current tensions in the East China Sea. We urged all parties concerned to
resolve territorial and maritime disputes in a peaceful manner, in accordance
with international laws. We stressed the importance of protecting the freedom
of navigation in and over-flight in the area and called on parties to refrain
from taking unilateral action that would increase tensions and change the
status quo."
On the
South China Sea, the draft joint statement said, "We expressed our concern
over recent development in the South China Sea and reaffirmed the importance of
regional cooperation in maintaining peace, stability and maritime security in
the region. We called on parties to settle dispute by peaceful means through
friendly consultation and dialogue in accordance with universally recognized
principles of international laws including the 1982 United Nations Convention
on the Law of the Sea," according to the same source.
Myanmar
plans to host a series of ASEAN and East Asia meetings Aug. 8-10, including the
security-related ASEAN Regional Forum, which brings together 27 countries that
have a bearing on the security of the Asia-Pacific region, including the United
States and North Korea.
Ties
between Tokyo and Beijing are strained as the two countries remain at odds over
the sovereignty of the Japanese-controlled Senkaku islands in the East China
Sea.
China,
which claims the islands and calls them the Diaoyu islands, has become
increasingly assertive at sea, frequently sending patrol ships near the
uninhabited islets.
Four
ASEAN claimants -- the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei -- are
involved in the issue of disputed islands in the South China Sea against the
increasingly assertive rival claimant China, and have been struggling to hammer
out a common position over the matter.
However,
the ministers at the scheduled Naypyitaw meeting will likely refrain from
mentioning the names of the countries involved in the East and South China sea
issues, the same source said.
The
10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations also includes Cambodia,
Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, Singapore and Thailand.
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