ASEAN expects more states to sign SEANWFZ Treaty
Jakarta (VNA) - The Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) will start negotiations with nuclear-weapon
states in signing the Protocol to the Treaty on the Southeast Asia Nuclear
Weapon-Free Zone (SEANWFZ Treaty), according to Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi of Indonesia - the country chairing the association this year.
Under the ASEAN Matters pillar, one of the three priorities set by Indonesia during its 4th term as ASEAN Chair, several issues
continue to be priorities and are being discussed continuously, including
the signing of the SEANWFZ Protocol by nuclear weapon states (NWS), which was
halted in 2012, she told the press in Jakarta.
The SEANWFZ Treaty, also known as the Bangkok
Treaty, was signed by all ASEAN member states in December 1995.
The treaty stipulates that its signatories cannot develop,
manufacture or otherwise acquire, possess or have control over nuclear weapons,
station or transport nuclear weapons by any means, or test or use nuclear
weapons.
The diplomat said the Protocol to the SEANWFZ
Treaty is also open to be signed by the five nuclear-weapon states namely
China, Russia, the US, the UK, and France.
She said China would be the first
of the five countries that expressed its willingness to sign the protocol, recalling that at the summit with ASEAN leaders held on November
21 last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping said that Beijing supports ASEAN's
efforts to build a nuclear weapon-free zone and is prepared to sign the
Protocol to the SEANWFZ Treaty as early as possible.
This commitment was reiterated by Chinese Foreign
Minister Qin Gang while receiving the visit of ASEAN Secretary General Kim Kao
Hourn in Beijing on March 27.
According to Retno, at the meeting in Phnom Penh
on August 2, 2022, the ASEAN Foreign Ministers, as the SEANWFZ Commission,
agreed to extend the Plan of Action (PoA) of the SEANWFZ Treaty to the
2023-2027 period.
As the chair of ASEAN in 2023, Indonesia is
committed to facilitating negotiations to find a common ground, she added./.