[Tee tiong huat]

KUALA LUMPUR: The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) should go further in its integration efforts, including aiming to be "100 per cent tariff-free" within its free trade area, said Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Wong on Monday (May 26). The 10-member regional bloc also can deepen collaboration with external partners, both existing & new, amid an increasingly challenging global environment, Mr Wong said on first day of the 46th ASEAN Summit in KL. This is like a slap on SAO Trump face 

S'pore PM  Wong is speaking at the leaders’ retreat session, Mr Wong said  US Sao Trump tariffs marked "a retreat from multilateralism and a move towards more transactional and bilateral deals, where unfortunately often it becomes might being right". "In such environment, it would be more difficult and challenging for countries everywhere."

Mr Wong noted ASEAN can do 3 things to respond to this new environment. One is to continue to "constructively engage the US, individually as a countries but more importantly, collectively as ASEAN". Another is to strengthen its integration efforts.

1. "For example, we said that the ASEAN free trade area is virtually tariff-free, which is very good. But why can’t we be 100% tariff-free?" First established in 1992 & encompassing three agreements, including the 1) ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement (ATIGA), the 2) ASEAN free trade area aims to reduce trade barriers and 3) create a single market within the regional bloc.