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ASEAN Community to enhance bloc's prestige, role on int'l arena: Cambodian FM

Xinhua, January 4, 2016 Adjust font size:

Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said on Monday that the ASEAN Community, which was officially launched last week, will enhance the bloc's prestige and pioneer role on regional and international arenas.

"The ASEAN Community will contribute to strengthening regional stability, peace and security and increasing the efficiency of ASEAN's core role in the region,"he said during a meeting with some 120 university students here.

"Nowadays, ASEAN is recognized as the most successful regional organization."

The ASEAN Community's opportunities are focused on a single market and production base with a free flow of goods, services, investments, capital and skilled labour, he said.

Hor Namhong, who is also a deputy prime minister, said that the ASEAN Community's challenges will include development gap, lack of human resources and skilled labour among new member states and lack of budget for ASEAN connectivity development such as physical connectivity, institutional connectivity and people-to-people connectivity.

Founded in 1967 in Thailand, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Endit