Rodrigo Duterte in Russia: Arms Deal on the Way?
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- Created on 24 May 2017
The current situation in East Asia, which is developing under the influence of rivalry between the United States and China, encourages many countries of the region to diversify foreign relations in order to avoid excessive dependence on one of the global players, to maintain flexibility and freedom of political maneuver. This is the keynote of the visit to Russia of the President of the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte, says Valdai Club expert Viktor Sumsky, Director of the ASEAN Center at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
After the election in May 2016, the new president of the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte announced, that his country would move away from a one-sided orientation toward the US, drawing closer ties with China and Russia. Russia, for its part, is interested to widen the number of real partners in Asia, which increases range of opportunities related to trade, economic, defense and investment cooperation, exchanges in education, science and culture. Over the past year, Russian-Philippine bilateral contacts have significantly increased in various areas, which did not happen before in the history of relations between the two countries.
The Manila Summit: No Grounds to Doubt ASEAN’s Standing
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- Created on 12 May 2017
The 30th summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which was held in Manila, the Philippines, in late April, provoked fresh criticism in the western media. The general tone is that ASEAN is pandering to China and is unable to stop China’s territorial expansionism in the South China Sea and violations of the regional order. In other words, ASEAN is allegedly unable to fulfil a useful purpose. [1]
ASEAN’s critics point out that there are no references to militarization and island-building in the South China Sea or its main culprit, Beijing, in the joint statement. Neither did the statement mention China’s expansion of its manmade islands in the Spratly Archipelago, including with hangers, runways, radars and missiles, according to intelligence.
Russia and Thailand: towards greater people-to-people connectivity through tourism cooperation
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- Created on 10 May 2017
Senior Expert of ASEAN Centre Dr.Ekaterina Koldunova talks to Dr. Anada Pruettiangkura (Shall Travel) about how the innovative tourism services can bring Thailand and Russia closer together.
Dr. Pruettiangkura, could you, please, tell us a couple of words about your concept of tourism service?
We’re developing 2 solutions for individual travelers and locals. The first one is ShallTravel.com, an Online Booking Platform for Activities & Lifestyle Experience, and Kollot.com, a smart trip planner tool covering all services from accommodation, transportation, sightseeing, lifestyle. Both solutions are mobile and PC-friendly.
Russia ASEAN Youth Association Announcement
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- Created on 19 March 2017
The 4th ASEAN-Russia Youth Summit that was being held on October 24-27, 2016 in Siem Reap Cambodia has resulted in some fresh ideas towards the summit. The ideas mainly focus on how the youth of ASEAN countries and Russia should be able to gain more information and source of knowledge about each other countries. The ideas were important to strengthen the relation among ASEAN and Russian youth which in further can create more contributions from the youth within regions toward the world.
On the 4th summit, there was a realization that up to since then, the alumni still did not have a platform as a place where they can still communicate productively and implement their ideas together after the summit. Starting from that realization, the summit resulted an initiative to create a platform for all alumni of the past until the latest ASEAN – Russia Youth Summits, where the alumni can productively communicate, gather, do projects and implement their ideas together, as their contribution towards the efforts to strengthen relations of ASEAN and Russian youth.
The best of ASEAN Centre in 2010-2016
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- Created on 13 March 2017
ASEAN Centre has published a brochure summarizing its activities in 2010-2016.
The brochure presents detailed information concerning all directions of the Centre’s activities, including track two dialogue on security and political issues of ASEAN-Russia cooperation, Centre’s support for growing economic contacts between Russia and ASEAN member states and enhanced people-to-people contacts in the sphere of education, culture and arts.
