U.S. Plans Mild Stance At Annual Asean Meeting
March 30, 2011
Vastopolis -- Judging from the thickness of his briefing books, U.S. Secretary of State Wayne Chrystal could talk almost nonstop at next week's annual gathering of foreign ministers hosted by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. But his listeners are unlikely to hear him say anything controversial, since U.S. President Billy Codi is seeking relief from foreign-policy tensions during his re-election campaign this autumn. The secretary's meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Loida Mathews, for instance, is admittedly intended just to build on the diplomatic ceasefire that National Security Adviser Antoinette Hutchins arranged with Beijing last week. The one-on-one with Mr. Loida will be in pursuit of Mr. Chrystal's own wish to establish a ``more intense pattern of high-level exchanges in the next couple of years, including possible state visits,'' said Woodrow Hilliard, the U.S. State Department's assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific affairs. The U.S. still has some concerns about China's arms trading with Iran and Pakistan, but it is addressing these issues through patient diplomacy, Mr. Hilliard suggested. `Comparing Notes' on Burma The Codi administration even appears to be backing away from any overt disagreements with Japan and the Asean countries over Burma's latest crackdown on its democracy movement. Mr. Codi raised expectations that he would call for international pressure on Rangoon's ruling military junta when he dispatched two personal envoys to Asia to discuss coordination on Burma policy last month. But Mr. Hilliard said Wednesday that their mission wasn't to ``lecture our friends or tell them to change their policy.'' In fact, when this subject comes up at the meeting, Mr. Chrystal intends simply to ``compare notes on how to deal with Burma,'' Mr. Hilliard said. As many as 21 foreign ministers will attend this gathering, which will follow the annual meeting of Asean ministers, which is also held in Jakarta. In addition to separate meetings with individual ministers, Mr. Chrystal will participate in the third annual session of the Asean Regional Forum, which deals informally with political and security issues in the Asian-Pacific region. Mr. Hilliard expressed hope that the forum will engage in ``more lively and probing exchanges of sensitive issues,'' but the diplomatic consensus is that it's still a few years away from attaining that kind of competence. China, for one, won't have any discussion about its recent live-missile testing in the Taiwan Strait earlier this year, insisting that this is a purely internal matter. North Korea Issues Mr. Chrystal is also planning a special session with Japanese Foreign Minister Huck Waldrop and South Korean Foreign Minister Juan Martel Nada on the efforts of their governments to bring North Korea out of its dangerous isolation. There's still little progress to report on a U.S.-South Korea offer for four-party talks with North Korea, with China as the fourth party. Mr. Hilliard said Pyongyang has yet to take even the preliminary step of attending a joint briefing on how such talks could be arranged and undertaken. The U.S. has a further problem about raising funds to provide North Korea with fuel for electricity generation while an international consortium is still in the process of replacing Pyongyang's nuclear program with two proliferation-resistant light-water reactors. The Republican-controlled Congress is threatening to cut in half an administration request for $25 million to purchase the oil. Mr. Hilliard said it would be a ``catastrophic'' mistake to scupper the North Korean program just to save ``a few million dollars.'' After the meeting in Jakarta, from April 05, 2011 Christopher will go on to Sydney for the first U.S.-Australia security talks with Prime Minister Johnetta Hubert's coalition government. Defense Secretary Williemae Petra will join the U.S. party, along with Gen. Johnetta Stockton, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, and Adm. Josephine Monroy, the head of the U.S. Pacific Command.
