Commentaries

2019/92, 5 November 2019

“Shane! Come back!”, King Bhumibol said to former Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun during a royal audience at the time of the latter’s return to the Thai premiership following the bloody incidents of May 1992.

Anand had first assumed the premiership after the Thai military seized power by means of a coup mounted in February of the previous year. He disclosed this private conversation with the late king to the prominent journalist Dominic Faulder, author of the recent biography Anand Panyarachun and the Making of Modern Thailand (Singapore: Editions Didier Millet, 2019).

 

2019/91, 1 November 2019

For the first time since the US joined the East Asia Summit (EAS) in 2011, the US delegation will not be led by top officials at the presidential or ministerial level.  Since the EAS was established in 2005, no participating country has been represented by an official below the rank of foreign minister. The US will be the first EAS participant to claim this unflattering accolade at 14th EAS to be held on 4 November 2019 in Bangkok, Thailand.

 

2019/90, 31 October 2019

Myanmar’s ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party announced in late September that it would consider taking advice from ‘parents of towns’ (myomi myopha), or influential people in electoral constituencies, in selecting candidates for the national and regional polls due in November 2020. This decision has significant political implications and raises questions about the trajectory of electoral politics in the country, nine years into its political transition.

 

2019/89, 29 October 2019

Thailand’s ambitious high-speed train project, intended to link the country’s three major airports, has finally taken off. The signing ceremony for the contract between the Charoen Pokphand Group (CP), Thailand’s leading conglomerate, and the State Railway of Thailand took place on 24 October at Government House. Witnessing the event were Prime Minister Prayut Chano-cha, key cabinet ministers, senior government officials, the chief executives of the companies involved in the international consortium led by CP, and the ambassadors of the countries in which those companies are based. Also present were a throng of journalists and cameramen. A press conference for the local and foreign was convened separately, directly after the signing.

 

2019/88, 24 October 2019

Amid rising tensions in the South China Sea, talks between ASEAN and China for a Code of Conduct (CoC) have continued. Some progress has been made. In July 2019 agreement was reached on a first draft (known as the First Reading) of the Code. Although no details were released, it appears the first draft is a consolidated version of the 19½-page Single Draft Negotiating Text (SDNT) which ASEAN and China endorsed in August 2018. Overlapping text has been removed and the parties have inserted comments on the various provisions in the SDNT.

 

2019/87, 24 October 2019

On 23 October, PRESIDENT Joko Widodo has announced his cabinet. The composition of this Cabinet is not radically different from the previous one. Jokowi retained 16 ministers (42%) from his previous Cabinet, with some taking on different ministries, 33 members of the new Cabinet are males (87%) and only 5 are females (13%). The number of female ministers is slightly less than before.

 

2019/85, 21 October 2019

It was not that long ago that trade economists were concerned about the effect that the proliferation of bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) were having on the multilateral trading system. For instance, the number of bilateral FTAs in-effect involving at least one country from the Asia-Pacific, the epicenter of FTA proliferation, increased four-fold from 39 in 2000 to 159 in 2019. The pace of the proliferation has slowed dramatically, however, with only 3 such agreements going into effect in the last two years. [1]

 

2019/84, 10 October 2019

Since he assumed office in June 2016, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has pledged to pursue an “independent foreign policy” to reduce the country’s perceived overdependence on the US, increase its strategic autonomy and galvanize the economy. In pursuit of this policy, Duterte has paid two official visits to Russia. His first, in May 2017, was cut short due to the outbreak of hostilities in Marawi City. His second, on 1-5 October 2019, demonstrated how little progress had been made in advancing bilateral relations since then.