RF Chief of General Staff to take part in ASEAN Def Min meeting.

12/10 Tass 9

HANOI, October 12 (Itar-Tass) - Chief of the General Staff of the RF
Armed Forces - First Deputy Defence Minister of Russia General Nikolai
Makarov will take part in an official meeting of defence ministers of 10
countries members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN)
and 8 partner states in the dialogue that will be held in Hanoi on Tuesday.
Among items for discussion at the meeting that is the first ever held
in such format are such matters as combating terrorism, ensuring security
at sea, response to natural calamities, including provision of
humanitarian aid to the population in emergencies, as well as prophylactic
peacekeeping measures in the region. Vietnam as the current meeting's host
and ASEAN current chair, voiced an initiative to hold, with the
participation of all sides concerned, a discussion devoted to prospects
for the creation of a new regional security structure and working out of
mechanisms of reacting to atypical threats.
According to the Vietnamese National Defence Ministry, at the first
meeting of the defence ministers of ASEAN + 8 (Australia, India, China,
New Zealand, South Korea, Russia, the United States and Japan) it is not
planned to consider and discuss controversial issues linked with regional
stability and security - such as the situation on the Korean Peninsula and
the conflict related to the dispute about ownership of the Paracel Islands
and Spratly Islands in the South China Sea in which 5 participant in the
consultations - Vietnam, China, Brunei, Malaysia and The Philippines - are
involved.
The ASEAN defence ministers' meetings with the partners in the
dialogue will become, according to a plan of its organisers, a unique
forum that will unite at the negotiating table for peace and stability
military leadership of absolutely different countries - large and small,
rich and poor, states with different ideologies. It is planned to adopt on
the results of the first meeting a joint statement that will reflect the
political will and aspiration of all its participants to develop
partnership aimed at the strengthening of peace and maintenance of
stability both in the region and all over the world.
ASEAN is a geopolitical and economic organisation of 10 countries
located in Southeast Asia, which was formed on 8 August 1967 by Indonesia,
Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Since then, membership
has expanded to include Brunei, Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Laos, and
Vietnam. Its aims include the acceleration of economic growth, social
progress, cultural development among its members, the protection of the
peace and stability of the region, and to provide opportunities for member
countries to discuss differences peacefully. ASEAN spans over an area of
4.46 million square km, 3 percent of the total land area of Earth, with a
population of approximately 580 million people, 8.7 percent of the world
population. In 2009, its combined nominal GDP had grown to more than 1.5
trillion US dollars. If ASEAN was a single country, it would rank as the
9th and the 3rd largest economy in the world and Asia in terms of nominal
GDP, respectively.
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