Minister of Foreign Affairs Sugiono Values ASEAN Has a Determining Position to Be Able to Set the Rhythm and Temperature of the World

Minister of Foreign Affairs Sugiono while giving information to the media in the Philippines. (Okta/Infomed/Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia)

JAKARTA - Indonesian Foreign Minister Sugiono assessed that ASEAN has a decisive position to be able to regulate the rhythm and temperature of the world, when the number of countries that are dialogue partners increases, in addition to countries and regions that are also interested in becoming ASEAN partners.

ASEAN officially granted the status of Sectoral Dialogue Partner to Germany and Qatar and officially accepted Turkey as the 12th Dialogue Partner. This announcement was made by Philippine Foreign Minister Ma. Theresa P. Lazaro at a press conference after the 59th ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting (AMM) Plenary Session, Tuesday.

Speaking to the media on the sidelines of the ASEAN Post Ministerial Conference (PMC) in Manila, Philippines, Wednesday (22/7), Foreign Minister Sugiono explained that the most important thing from the increase in the number of ASEAN partners is the existence of tangible benefits for the Region.

"With the involvement of many countries, I think ASEAN has a decisive position, which can actually regulate the rhythm and temperature of the world," said Indonesian Minister Sugiono.

"Because with the centrality of ASEAN, yes, they are part of our term, they cannot dictate their wishes, their interests without considering the environment in ASEAN itself," he said.

Furthermore, Foreign Minister Sugiono said that many parties wanted to be ASEAN partners because they saw "this is a calm region, a stable region. That's the first, they see that ASEAN has potential."

"Therefore, we make this stability, peace and tranquility as leverage, which I said earlier, can also determine the temperature of the world, that is what we need to raise," he said.

However, ASEAN, he continued, also hopes that the various cooperation carried out will bear fruit in "increasing our human resources, bearing fruit in the level of trade and investment figures in ASEAN, bearing fruit in ASEAN's energy resilience, bearing fruit in ASEAN's food security, which is the end of ASEAN's welfare."

Asked whether the above-mentioned things made the Chinese, American and Russian Foreign Ministers attend the ASEAN meeting in the midst of the current dynamic global atmosphere, Foreign Minister Sugiono said, "I think they are coming with a friendly tone and tone, cool and cold.

It is known that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov attended the ASEAN PMC meeting. In addition to holding separate meetings with ASEAN, China, Russia and the United States are also member countries of the East Asia Summit (EAS) which is scheduled to hold a meeting on Thursday.