1. The East Asia Summit: Present and Future
By: Danny Rahdiansyah1
Last year in Bali, at the 6th East Asia Summit (EAS), we made history.
The 6th EAS will always be remembered as the turning point when the East Asia Summit was
enlarged from its initial form. The Russian Federation and the United States of America officially
joined the EAS, making this dynamic regional grouping consist of 18 participating countries.
It was also the moment when the Leaders of the EAS adopted the Declaration of the EAS on
the Principles for Mutually Beneficial Relations, which consisted of common norms and
principles taken from previous ASEAN and other relevant documents. The Declaration then
served as guidelines for inter-state affairs in the region to maintain and promote peace and
stability.
The adoption of the Declaration also reinforced the Indonesia’s notion of “Dynamic Equilibrium”.
This concept views the East Asia region without any preponderant power that dominates the
state of affairs, in which countries could interact with one another in a state of positive
engagement, to pursue efforts of maintaining and promoting peace and stability, in accordance
with ASEAN principles and mechanisms.
It can also be argued that the 6th East Asia Summit is the apex of the EAS cooperation so far
since its conception in Kuala Lumpur, back in 2005. In its 6-year of existence, the EAS has
established itself to become a prime dialogue forum for Leaders to discuss broad strategic,
political economic issues of common interest and concern with the aim of promoting peace,
stability and economic prosperity in East Asia, as enshrined in the Kuala Lumpur Declaration on
the East Asia Summit.
Furthermore, cooperation in the so-called initial five priority areas namely finance, energy and
environment, education, avian flu prevention, and disaster management are also flourishing.
In the finance sector, various workshops and capacity building activities have been developed
which included related stakeholders from EAS participating countries.
In the energy and environment sector, a number of ministerial meetings, task force in energy, as
well as high level seminar in environmental issues have been conducted, making this sector one
of the most advanced under the aegis of EAS.
The education sector is also on the rise. Study to boost educational cooperation in the EAS for
regional competitiveness and community building as well as youth exchanges activities been
conducted. Last year, an informal EAS Education Ministerial Meeting took place, paving the way
for the full-fledged meeting in 2012.
In the cooperation of avian flu prevention, EAS leaders have agreed to broaden the scope of
cooperation to encompass global health and communicable diseases.
1
Works at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Indonesia. This is his personal opinion

2. Last but not least, cooperation in the field of disaster management has advanced with the
endorsement of Indonesian-Australian Paper: A Practical Approach to Enhance Regional
Cooperation on Disaster Rapid Response, which was geared towards concrete cooperation in
the aftermath of disaster, particularly in the clusters of information sharing, overcoming
bottleneck, as well as fostering capacity building, promoting collaboration and partnership in
disaster response.
Besides the abovementioned area of cooperation, the 6th East Asia Summit also agreed to
include ASEAN Connectivity as a new priority area of cooperation.
From that vantage point, it is high time for us to put a simple question, yet very pertinent,
namely what will be the future direction of the East Asia Summit?
Building upon the development of the EAS so far, I am of the opinion that, first, another
enlargement, at least in the near future, is less likely to happen. The East Asia Summit will
adjust itself, and make itself comfortable, with the new composition of eighteen participating
countries.
What about the European Union? During the 18th ASEAN-EU Ministerial Meeting in Madrid, May
2010, the EU had voiced its intention to participate in the EAS. But until now, the process of EU
accession to the TAC has not been concluded, pending ratification of the 3rd protocol to the TAC
by all High Contracting Parties. As we all aware, all EAS participating countries have acceded to
the TAC. Thus, we will not be seeing EU in the EAS, at least for the near future.
Next, I would say that the EAS, as a leaders-led forum, will maintain and strengthen dialogue in
broad strategic political economic issues of common interest and concern. At the last Summit,
President SBY put forward four main agendas for EAS cooperation in the future, namely
common effort to strengthen economy in East Asia; common effort to promote sustainable
development, food and energy security and climate change; common effort to tackle non-
traditional security challenges; and common effort to maintain peace, security, and stability in
East Asia region. In this connection, it would be very important for Indonesia’s diplomatic
machinery to pursue those agendas in the relevant EAS as well as ASEAN mechanisms. The
challenge would be to synergize the above agendas with the ongoing priority areas of
cooperation.
Finally, I am of the view that EAS will need a stronger mechanism to follow up Leaders’
directives at Summit level into the system down below. In this regard, there is a necessity to
synchronize various existing mechanisms under the framework of EAS process, taking into
consideration the principle of ASEAN in the driving force. Furthermore, EAS will also need a
stronger secretarial support from ASEAN Secretariat to serve the growing EAS process in the
future.
From the above points, I am confident that the EAS in its current form will continue to flourish to
be the premier forum for discussing strategic issues in East Asia. EAS process will also
reinforce other existing regional mechanisms, including but not limited to the ASEAN+1,
ASEAN+3, ARF, and APEC, with the view to strengthen the regional architecture in East Asia.
Indonesia and ASEAN should seize the opportunity now, building on the momentum of the EAS
achievement so far, especially from the latest Summit in Bali.
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