Look beyond present to 20-40 years ahead, Philippines president asks world leaders

As the region’s largest source of official development assistance (ODA), Japan will provide leadership to the important arena of sustainable development, she said.

“We would like to see Japan playing a leading role in contributing to integration in the region and maintaining and pursuing international peace and security as we try to forge the East Asia community,” the President said.

She added that as China and India become true political and economic giants, their leadership obligations to their neighbors also increase, separate from their obligations to their own citizens.

The President said that while Japan, China and India are active participants in the East Asia summit, which has the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in the driver’s seat, it is through Asean’s leadership that the vision of an East Asia Community, once unthinkable and believed unattainable in this lifetime, is gradually taking shape,” she added.

As chair of Asean this year, the President recalled that during the Asean Summit last January in Cebu City, Asean exercised leadership in integration by taking several important steps to “create a regional community by 2015.”

The most notable of which, the President said, was the declaration on the Asean Charter. “At a time of uncertainty in the world, we are proud that Asean took a bold step forward and not a timid step back,” the President said. (OPS)