US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, left, chats with Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa before the start of a joint press conference after their meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia, Monday, Sept. 3, 2012. Clinton hopes to encourage unity among Southeast Asian nations in an effort to manage increasingly tense disputes with China. AP PHOTO/DITA ALANGKARA
JAKARTA—US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Indonesia on Monday hoping to encourage Southeast Asian nations to present a united front to the Chinese in dealing with territorial disputes in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea).
Clinton is in Indonesia’s capital Jakarta to offer strong US support for a regionally endorsed plan to ease rising tensions by implementing a code of conduct for all claimants to disputed islands in the West Philippine Sea.
Jakarta is the headquarters of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), and Clinton will also press the group to insist that China agree to a formal mechanism to reduce short-term risks of conflict and ultimately come to final settlements over sovereignty.
She wants “to strengthen Asean unity going forward,” a senior US official told reporters on board Clinton’s plane as she flew from the Cook Islands to Australia for a brief refueling stop on the way to Indonesia.
Clinton’s last trip to the region in July was marred by the failure of Asean to reach a consensus at talks in Cambodia, amid divisions in the 10-member group on how to treat a rising China.
The top US diplomat was scheduled to meet Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa shortly after arriving in Jakarta, and the following day will hold talks with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and also visit the headquarters of Asean, part of her effort to promote ties with the economically dynamic and mostly US-friendly bloc.
Diplomatic process
She hopes “to get a sense of where we are and to get the Indonesians’ advice about how we can be supportive, how we can put more wind into the sails of a diplomatic effort, which is what we all very much want,” the senior US official on her airplane said on customary condition of anonymity.
“The most important thing is that we end up in a diplomatic process where these issues are addressed in a strong diplomatic conversation between a unified Asean and China rather than through any kind of coercion,” the official said.
Indonesia played a leading role in putting the six-point plan together after the Asean failure in July. The official said the United States was “encouraged” by the plan, but wanted it acted on, particularly implementation and enforcement of the code of conduct, which had languished since a preliminary framework for it was first agreed in 2002.
Clinton, who made a refueling stop in Brisbane, Australia, on her way from a South Pacific summit in the Cook Islands, will head on Tuesday to China for talks on the often uneasy relationship between the world’s two largest economies.
The Philippines and Vietnam have both accused China of an intimidation campaign over territorial disputes in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea), a waterway through which half of the world’s cargo sails.
Territorial disputes
The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan claim parts of the sea that are within their exclusive economic zones. Islands, reefs and atolls in those areas are believed to be sitting on vast oil and gas deposits.
China claims sovereignty over the entire sea, but refuses to bring its dispute with the other claimants to an international court for arbitration.
But the Philippines, which figured in a two-month maritime standoff with China at Panatag Shoal (Scarborough Shoal) in the West Philippine Sea recently, is going ahead and bringing its case to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (Itlos) with or without China.
Clinton, in a visit to Vietnam in 2010, buoyed Southeast Asian nations by declaring freedom of navigation in the West Philippine Sea to be a US national interest, although she said that Washington would not take sides over disputes.
The United States recently issued an unusually strong warning to China after Beijing angered Southeast Asian nations by establishing a remote garrison on Woody Island, in the Paracel chain in the West Philippine Sea. China accused Clinton of seeking to “contain” its rise.
US supports code
The official on Clinton’s plane said the United States supported a recent statement of principles by Asean foreign ministers, who pledged unity and the early completion with China of the code of conduct for the West Philippine Sea.
The United States has strongly encouraged work on the code, believing it is vital to preventing flare-ups from escalating. But Beijing has preferred to negotiate separately with Asean nations instead of dealing with a united bloc.
Asean Secretary General Surin Pitsuwan cautioned that too much attention on the issue could prove counterproductive.
“We just hope that all the attention and the concern would not add to the fragility and instability over the issue. Want a conducive environment that would enable us to achieve the [code of conduct] as soon as possible. As a major dialogue partner, the US certainly has a role to play and a contribution to make,” Surin told AFP.
Clinton will later in the week visit Brunei, making her the first US secretary of state to visit all 10 Asean nations. Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi in August visited Indonesia and Brunei and took a conciliatory tone.
Mob violence
The administration of US President Barack Obama, who spent part of his childhood in Indonesia, took office with a mission to expand relations with the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation, seeing it as an ideal partner due to its embrace of democracy and historically moderate brand of Islam.
But momentum for closer relations has faltered, in part due to concern in the United States over recent mob violence by Indonesian Islamists against minorities.
The US official said Indonesia was still considered a “model of tolerance,” but voiced alarm over “disturbing incidents” in recent months.
Clinton will “seek views with the Indonesian leadership on how they see things in the wake of those incidents and what the process is going forward to ensure that all communities feel safe and protected,” the official said.
Mobs have ransacked religious sites and attacked members of the Ahmadiyah Muslim sect along with Shiites and Christians.
Religious intolerance
Human Rights Watch has called on Clinton to press Indonesia to take “concrete steps” to deal with religious intolerance, saying that government policies and inaction were fueling the violence.
Originally posted: 11:43 pm | Monday, September 3rd, 2012