US, Japan defence ministers engage with ASEAN counterparts

Defence ministers and officials from the U.S., China and Russia, among other countries, gathered in Jakarta on Thursday (November 16) with their counterparts from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), where they are expected to discuss geopolitical crises in and outside the region.

Defence ministers from the regional bloc called on Wednesday (November 15) for a ceasefire in Gaza and a durable solution in Myanmar as conflicts deepen there.

Other countries participating on Thursday are Australia, New Zealand and others, while Myanmar is absent. Myanmar’s generals have been barred from high-level meetings of the 10-member ASEAN since they seized power in a 2021 coup and unleashed violence on those who challenged their takeover.

The annual meeting comes as conflict rages on in the Middle East and Ukraine and tensions rise over waters in the South China Sea.

The Southeast Asian bloc ASEAN on Friday strongly condemned what it called a “heinous terrorist attack” in the southern Philippines at the weekend in which four people were killed in a bombing at a Catholic Mass.

The bomb went off on Sunday during a service at a university gymnasium in Marawi, a city left in ruins in 2017 by a five-month military campaign to end an occupation by Islamic State loyalists that triggered alarm in Asia about the group’s influence.