CEBU CITY—President Arroyo said on Sunday that the 12th Asean Summit has broken “new ground” and has brought the regional grouping closer to its envisioned “formidable bloc” with the endorsement of a blueprint for an updated charter, and fresh pacts on security, migrant workers and trade.

In her statement as summit chairman dated January 13 but issued only a day later, the President said that Asean leaders had “resolved” to enhance the group’s standing as an “effective driving force” for the region’s initiatives.

“We resolved to uphold the centrality of Asean and to enhance its standing as an effective driving force for regional initiatives and collective responses to the challenges and opportunities facing our region, countries and people,” she said.           

She said the leaders endorsed the report of the Eminent Persons Group (EPG) tasked to draw up the blueprint for a new Asean charter, in recognition of the fact that “Asean must remain cohesive with strong institutions and responsive policies for regional community building.”               

The blueprint presented by the EPG to the leaders on Sunday night will be part of the basis for the drafting of the Asean Charter, and will be completed by the High Level Task Force in time for the 13th Summit in Singapore later this year.            

In a separate statement, the President said that “with the Asean moving forward towards firm accords on its own charter, security, overseas workers, and trade, the prospect for the region becoming a formidable bloc in the world is well within our reach.”                  

“This Summit will break new ground as we continue to foster peace and stability, economic prosperity and claim our collective destiny . . . From a sharing and caring community, we can become a dynamo as the hub and core of East Asia, immersed in robust, open trade from within the region and across the oceans—building security and prosperity in millions of communities from east to west,” she said.                   

She noted that “the unequivocal commitment and common spirit of the leaders of the region have carved out an unprecedented road map of Asean community towards closer integration and greater heights of achievement by 2015, backed by enhanced economic, political and sociocultural partnerships.”

Mrs. Arroyo said the Asean has “sailed towards unity as one formidable alliance to stamp out poverty, address inequality in its varied dimensions, attend to the social impact of economic integration, guarantee social protection and sound environmental governance and focus on the welfare of our workers.”             

With such efforts, she said, “it is payback time for a region whose legacy to its peoples is within reach.”     

Mrs. Arroyo said the Asean Declaration on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of Migrant Workers on Saturday is “a concrete manifestation” of their “collective commitment” to recognize the role of migrant workers in regional development.    

The leaders also signed the Asean Convention on Counterterrorism to enhance the region’s capacity to confront terrorism, and to deepen counterterrorism cooperation among law enforcement and other concerned authorities.                 

She said the leaders welcomed the Philippine initiative to forge closer cooperation with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), “which is Asean’s immediate neighbor and a potential partner in promoting peace, security and prosperity in the region,” and tasked their respective officials to look for ways to fortify links with the SCO.              

She said the leaders agreed to strengthen poverty and hunger alleviation goals under the World Food Summit, the UN Millennium Development Goals and the Vientienne Action Program (VAP) and undertook to support further resource mobilization for agriculture and rural development in the Asean.     

The leaders also adopted the Asean Statement urging the Paris Club to seriously consider the Philippine proposal raised at the Asean Inter-Parliamentary Assembly for debt equity arrangements to fund MDG projects,            

Mrs. Arroyo said the leaders welcomed the accession of France and Timor Leste to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC) in Southeast Asia on Saturday, as this “enhances the Treaty as our principal regional instrument governing peaceful interstate relations, and should be followed by closer peace and security cooperation with Asean in the region in the United Nations and other international fora.”      

The TAC provides a code of conduct for the peaceful settlement of disputes and mandates the establishment of a high council of ministerial representatives from the parties as a dispute-settlement mechanism.           

The leaders also adopted the Third Asean Work Program on HIV and AIDS for 2006-2010 and supported the Asean Task Force on AIDS to strengthen regional response to the dread disease.

CEBU—Member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) signed on Sunday a framework agreement with China on trade in services (TIS), a key move toward a future free-trade agreement (FTA) between Beijing and the regional bloc.

CEBU CITY—Southeast Asian leaders have expressed their “continuing concern” over the situation in Iraq and the Middle East, and have called for a dialogue between the contending parties in Iraq to pave the way for national reconciliation in the war-torn country.

CEBU CITY—President Arroyo said on Sunday that the 12th Asean Summit has broken “new ground” and has brought the regional grouping closer to its envisioned “formidable bloc” with the endorsement of a blueprint for an updated charter, and fresh pacts on security, migrant workers and trade.

CEBU CITY—In what is considered a “very major step” by one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, China on Sunday agreed to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with the Asean on an Asean-China center on trade, investment and tourism promotion.

The economic managers said on Friday the country’s macroeconomic underpinnings this year should prove significantly stronger than originally assumed, one where local output or the gross domestic product were to quicken to as high as 6.1 percent from the  expectation of just 5.8 percent.

ANOTHER apparent money-making scheme by telecommunications companies already raking in multibilllion net profits each year has consumers up in arms, and a consumer advocacy group has asked the National Telecommunications Commission to immediately stop two of these telecom giants from imposing expiry dates on free text allocations and free airtime loads, which would begin Monday.

THE government may grant the appeal of power firm STEAG AG for a new power supply agreement in view of its proposed capacity expansion of up to 100 megawatts to 50 megawatts for the 210-megawatt Mindanao Coal power plant.

HONG KONG—China’s leading pharmaceutical giant is set for a battle with multinational companies (MNCs) as it opens its branch in the Philippines next month, banking on the growing popularity of Chinese medicine and alternative treatments.