MONDAY, JULY 28, 2003
Malaysia, Thailand for SE Asian economic unity
AP
LANGKAWI: Malaysia's Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Sunday urged Southeast Asian countries to integrate their economies more - like the European Union - so they can better resist Western-imposed trade rules.
``The demand is that the world standardize all business practices ... based on rules invented by the rich to suit them, to enrich them,'' Mahathir said at a business forum where guests included his Thai counterpart, Thaksin Shinawatra.
The EU was ``a good guide for cross-border collaboration,'' Mahathir said at the forum in Langkawi, a resort island 450 kilometers north of Kuala Lumpur.
``Unified, (the EU) will become a powerful state, able to supply practically all its needs, becoming almost a world unto itself as the United States is,'' Mahathir said in a speech to 300 Malaysian and Thai business leaders.
Southeast Asia can eventually ``achieve much of what the Europeans have achieved,'' Mahathir said.
But ``because we are not as homogenous as the Europeans, we must begin by experimenting with limited integration,'' he said.
Mahathir said the 10-country Association of Southeast Asian Nations should encourage more bilateral cooperation, along with regional initiatives such as the ASEAN Free Trade Area, to boost integration and reduce reliance on the West.
ASEAN's members are Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Thai leader Thaksin said in a speech that regional alliances would bolster economic security in Southeast Asia, which he said had a population of more than 500 million.
``I believe that in a tendency of long-term growth, ASEAN will be the most dynamic economy of Asia after China,'' Thaksin said. ``We cannot struggle alone, and we cannot survive if we are left behind all by ourselves.''
Mahathir and Thaksin had a private lunch after the business forum. They were set to hold bilateral talks later Sunday on issues such as border security and the detention of Myanmar's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
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