Under the leadership of Surin Pitsuwan, the ship of ASEAN sailed, albeit
with some difficulties, through troubled waters over the last several years.
With his Harvard doctorate,
pleasant personality and diplomatic skills, Surin, the former prime minister of
Thailand, was considered the right person to fill the association’s hot seat.
However, in less than five
months, Surin must relinquish his job, leaving the gargantuan task of building
the ASEAN Community by 2015 to a successor.
Barring any unexpected
developments, Vietnam’s deputy foreign minister Le Luong Minh, will become the
association’s next secretary-general.
Officially, Vietnam has not yet
named Minh, a career diplomat, as its candidate for ASEAN’s top post, which is
held on a rotating basis.
“The post of ASEAN
secretary-general is being rotated alphabetically every five years among its
10-member countries. It is now Vietnam’s turn to take the secretary-general
post from Thailand,” Vietnam’s Permanent Representative to ASEAN, Ambassador Vu
Dang Dung, told The Jakarta Post recently in Jakarta.
However, no other candidates have
been said to be in the running for the job.
“Our government is planning to
nominate our deputy foreign minister, Le Luong Minh, for the post of ASEAN
secretary-general. The final decision will be made at the next ASEAN Summit in
Phnom Penh” in November, a source at the Vietnamese Prime Minister’s Office
told the Post in Hanoi recently. Although the appointment has not been
approved, Surin has welcomed Minh’s appointment.
“I feel relieved already,” Surin
said at a press conference during the 20th ASEAN Summit in Phnom Penh,
Cambodia, in April as reported by talkvietnam.com.
Minh is an alumnus of Jawaharlal
Nehru University in New Delhi, India. He joined the foreign service in 1975,
just after the reunification of Vietnam.
The extensive experience that
Minh has accumulated representing Vietnam at the United Nations will be a boon
at the helm of the regional association.
Minh, who is married and has two
daughters, spent 14 years working at the United Nations, including seven years
as the permanent representative of Vietnam in Geneva, Switzerland, and New York
City in the US.
The 60-year-old became the
president of the UN’s most powerful body, the Security Council, twice — first
in July 2008 and again in October 2009 — when Vietnam held non-permanent seat
on the Security Council.
Minh has served as Vietnam’s
deputy foreign minister since December 2008.
If selected, Minh will assume his
new post on Jan. 1, 2013.
The 10 members of the Association
of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, the
Philippines, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore, Laos, Cambodia and Brunei
Darussalam.
Veeramalla Anjaiah
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