We have produced the pre-convention newsletter (issue 4-1) and you should be receiving your copy soon. In it you will find, among other things, feedback from the Singapore conference as well as a list of panels we are sponsoring or co-sponsoring in New Orleans.In case you do not receive the latter in time, here they are:
Wednesday
8.15AM-10AM
Cambridge,
Hilton
New
Orleans, Riverside
Social
Innovation as
An
Alternative Approach to Development
12.30PM-1.30PM
Bridge,
Hilton New Orleans Riverside
Caucus
Business Meeting:
Please
Come
4PM-5.45 PM
Beauregard,
Loews New Orleans
Living Globalization: Female
Academics at Home and Abroad (Roundtable)
Thursday
8.15AM-10AM
Marlborough A,
Hilton New Orleans Riverside
At the Margins of Global South
1.45PM-3.30PM
Trafalgar,
Hilton New Orleans
Riverside
Diplomatic Strategies of Leading
Nations in the Global South
(Preliminary Book Launch)
1.45PM-3.30PM
Grand Salon 3:
The
Transnational Production of International Borders in the Global South
4PM-5.45 PM
Suite 743
Hilton New
Orleans Riverside
The Other Transatlantic Relationship: Latin America and Europe4-5.45PM
River, Hilton Riverside:
Mentoring Women in the Global South
Friday
8.1510AM
HEC-A,
Hilton New Orleans Riverside
Presidential Theme Panel: The United
Nations and Development:
The View from
The Global South
10AM-12.15PM
Feliciana
East, Hilton Riverside
‘Africa’s Great Awakening’ (II): Representing The
‘Africa Rising’ Debate
11.15AM-1PM
Distinguished Scholar Honoree LUNCHEON
Café Adelaide, Loews
4PM-5.45PM
Windsor,
Hilton Riverside
South-South Cooperation
Saturday
1.45PM-3.30PMCambridge,
Hilton Riverside
Women’s Inclusion in Peace Processes
4PM-5.45PM
Suite
806, Hilton Riverside
Strategic Politics for the Small, Poor and
Powerless: Caribbean Integration as Global Politics
Enjoy the conference.
_____________________________________________________________
Here is the text of Ambassador Tommy Koh's speech in Singapore
Will There Be Peace in Asia?
Salutations
President
Arnoud de Meyer, Dean James Tang, Professor Amitav Acharya, Professor Thomas
Volgy, Professor Jacqueline Braveboy-Wagner, Ladies and Gentlemen.
2 I
join Arnoud and James in welcoming the members of the International Studies
Association to Singapore. Founded in
1959, the ISA has over 6,000 members and is regarded as the premier
organisation for scholars and practitioners in the field of international
studies. You do us honour by holding
your meeting in Singapore.
3 I
would like to congratulate my good friend, Professor Amitav Acharya, for being
the first Asian to have been elected as the President of ISA. I thank Amitav for inviting me to speak to
you. I tried to convince him that I am
not qualified to speak to this learned community but he would not take no for
an answer.
Two
Anniversaries
4 I
would like to explain why I have chosen to speak on the topic: Will There Be Peace in Asia? War and Peace have been on my mind recently
because in 2014, we commemorated the 100th anniversary of the
outbreak of World War I. An old book,
The Guns of August, and a new book, The Sleepwalkers, provided much food for
thought. The two big lessons I have
learnt from WWI are that, one, economic inter-dependence is not a guarantee of
peace and two, we must never underestimate man’s capacity for
irrationality. This year, we mark the 70th
anniversary of the end of World War II.
5 Asia
is living in a golden moment of history. After decades and centuries of stagnation and
regress, the region is on the rise.
Inspired by the success of Japan, other Asian countries and economies have
grown and are growing rapidly. South
Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore have already caught up with the OECD
countries. ASEAN, China and India are
determined to complete their journeys to become developed and modern
countries.
6 Asia’s
prospects are good. However, this is
predicated on one essential condition – peace.
If peace is replaced by war and conflict, Asia’s rise would be
scuttled. Without peace, economic
development and nation-building would be difficult, if not possible.
Threats
To Peace
7 What
are the potential threats to peace in Asia?
I have identified the following six potential hot spots:
(i)
The Korean peninsula
(ii)
India and Pakistan
(iii)
India and China
(iv)
China and Japan
(v)
The South China Sea
(vi)
China and USA
The
Korean Peninsula
8 The
situation on the Korean peninsula is inherently unstable. This is due to the unpredictable nature of
the North Korean regime, the fact that it has both nuclear weapons and
ballistic missiles and the fact that Pyongyang needs an external enemy in order
to unite the people to support the Kim regime.
China seems to be frustrated with its North Korean ally but does not
seem to have the leverage to influence its behaviour. Rebuffed by China, Kim has turned to Russia
for protection and support. The Six Party
Talks has been suspended and there are currently no plans to resume them. The
recent exchange of new year greetings between the leaders of North and South
Korea is a small but positive development. I expect the Korean peninsula to be peaceful
in 2015.
Will
India and Pakistan Live in Peace?
9 Although
68 years have passed since the partition of British-administered India into two
states, India and Pakistan, the wounds of that bitter partition have not
healed. The dispute over Kashmir
continues to rankle and pose an obstacle to win-win cooperation between
them. Pakistan is politically fragile
and faces a growing threat from the Pakistani Taliban. The fact that both India and Pakistan possess
nuclear weapons makes a conflict between them more dangerous but also less
likely because the stakes are so high.
The new Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, is focused on India’s accelerated
development. He wants peace with all his
neighbours, as was shown by his gesture of inviting their leaders to his inauguration.
I believe that Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif of Pakistan wants the same thing for his country.
Will
China and India Rise Together?
10 China
and India have been friends for over 1,000 years. As Amartya Sen has written in his book, The
Argumentative Indian, “intellectual links between China and India, stretching
over much of the first millennium and beyond, were important in the history of
the two countries.” For example, in the
8th century, the Chinese Emperor appointed an Indian scientist,
Gautama Siddhartha (Qutan Sida) as the President of the Chinese Board of
Astronomy.
11 In
the 1950s, relations between China and India were very good. PM Nehru had extended India’s hand of friendship
to China, at a time when it was being treated as a pariah by the West. When Premier Zhou En Lai visited New Delhi,
he was greeted by banners proclaiming that Chinese and Indians were brothers.
12 The
1962 border conflict between China and India had unfortunately put an end to
the era of good relations between them.
There is a deficit of trust between them as well as serious problems
concerning their borders, water, trade and Tibet. However, they share many more convergent than
divergent interests. The world is big
enough to accommodate a rising China and a rising India. There is no reason for them to engage in a
zero sum competition.
China-Japan
Ties
13 I
would like to put the current disagreement between China and Japan over
Senkaku/Diaoyu in perspective. Relations
between China and Japan go back 2,000 years.
With four exceptions, they have lived at peace with each other. The two countries are geographically
neighbours, share many historical and cultural affinities and are economically
inter-dependent. For example, China is
Japan’s largest trading partner. Until
two years ago, Japan was China’s largest foreign investor. Economically, Japan needs China and China
needs Japan. It is logical for them to
cooperate and illogical for them to treat each other as adversaries.
15 However,
logic and reason do not always prevail in relations between states. The relations between China and Japan are
burdened by history and rising nationalism on both sides. I would, however, remind the two countries
that from 1972 until about 2012, a period of 40 years, the two countries were
able to put aside their differences and focused on a positive agenda. I wish to recall that on 7 May 2008,
President Hu Jintao of China and Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda of Japan issued a
joint statement, pledging to turn the East China Sea, into a sea of peace,
friendship and cooperation.
16. After
a hiatus of over two years, the leaders of China and Japan, met in Beijing, in
November 2014, on the side-lines of the APEC Summit. The two leaders agreed to improve their
bilateral relations and eschew the path of confrontation. We should see a gradual improvement in their
relations in 2015.
South
China Sea
17. Relations
between China and Southeast Asia/ASEAN are strong, multi-dimentional and
mutually beneficial. There is, however,
one issue, the South China Sea, which could disrupt this happy state of
affairs. China and 4 ASEAN countries,
Brunei, Malaysia, Philippines and Vietnam have territorial disputes in the South
China Sea. In 2002, ASEAN and China
signed a Declaration of Conduct on the South China Sea. The two sides are currently negotiating a
binding Code of Conduct but progress has been extremely slow. In the meantime, the Philippines has invoked
its rights under the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and
instituted arbitral proceedings against China.
China has refused to participate in those proceedings on the ground that
the arbitral tribunal lacks jurisdiction.
Vietnam has recently submitted a statement to the Arbitral Tribunal.
18. The
South China Sea disputes involve complicated questions of law, history and
power. ASEAN, as a group, does not take
sides on the merits of the disputes.
ASEAN is, however, united on the stand that these disputes must be
resolved peacefully and on the basis of international law, including UNCLOS.
China-US
Relations
19. The
most important bilateral relationship is that between China and the United
States. Although the two countries
engage each other, in regular dialogue, at different levels, there is an
enormous deficit of trust between them.
For this reason, and because of their historical and cultural
differences, they do not understand each other and misread each other’s
intentions.
20. For
example, the Chinese interprete President Barack Obama’s pivot to Asia or
rebalancing to Asia, as a disguised form of containment. The Chinese believe that their problems with
their neighbours are due to American machinations.
21. The
US, on the other hand, suspects that the Chinese agenda is to reduce US
influence and leadership in the region, in the short term and to oust her from
the region, in the long-term. The
Americans perceive China’s activities as an attempt to create a Chinese sphere
of influence and to impose Pax Sinica on her neighbours.
22. Can
the incumbent superpower and the rising power live at peace with each
other? That is the critical question for
us to ponder. History is not helpful
because one study by Harvard University showed that in a majority of such
cases, war was the consequence. War is,
however, not inevitable. I believe that
President Obama and President Xi are determined to find a peaceful path
forward.
CONCLUSION
23. I
shall conclude. Many countries and
peoples in Asia will be celebrating the lunar new year on the 19th
February. The new year is the Year of
the Sheep, a symbol of peace. As an
optimist, I believe that Asia will be at peace in the Year of the Sheep.
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