-Excellency Najib Razak, Chairman of the Summit,
-Excellencies Leaders of Plus Three Countries,
-Your Majesty the Sultan, Excellencies Leaders of ASEAN Countries,
-Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen!
To begin with, I would like to express my high appreciation to today discussion, which serves as an important platform to once again underscore our commitment and future goal; particularly, in the framework of ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), which was recently launched. In the meantime, I would like to express my warm welcome to the positive result of tripartite summit between the Republic of Korea, People’s Republic of China and Japan to strengthen economic and trade cooperation between the three countries, as well as contributing to enhance cooperation between ASEAN and the Plus Three countries.
For the ASEAN Plus Three (APT) Cooperation, my exceptional pride and deep congratulation are extended to the noticeable progress and gradual development of all sectors over the last 17 years. For our future direction, please allow me to share some ideas as follows:
First. The launch of AEC in 2015 marked a significant milestone toward achieving the long-term goal of building a vibrant East Asia Economic Community; particularly, through enhancing APT’s cooperation and ASEAN’s centrality role in the region. In this regard, I would like to extent my profound appreciation on the remarkable progress of regional trade and investment cooperation between ASEAN Plus Three countries, which tremendously contributes to strengthening more concrete regional economic foundation. To maintain this momentum, Cambodia would like to urge ASEAN-China Center, ASEAN-ROK Center and ASEAN-Japan Center to further promoting cooperation on trade, investment and tourism among the APT countries and working closely together to further enhance the development of regional Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs).
Second. The AEC, which starts operation next year, will continue to emphasize the importance of connectivity among member countries as well as ASEAN’s partners. In this sense, financing mobilization to promote the successful implementation of connectivity plan among member countries remains critical. Within this spirit, Cambodia would extend our strong support on China’s initiative in establishing Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), Japan’s initiative on Partnership for Quality Infrastructure and Korea’s support on a number of regional connectivity projects in response to the financing needs for necessary infrastructure development in the region. Moreover, I would encourage the Plus Three countries to continue their active participation in order to achieve a successful implementation of the Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity 2025.
Third. Aiming at maintaining economic and financial stability as well as promoting regional economic and free trade cooperation, Cambodia would like to extend our support to China’s measures in promoting growth and enhancing financial stability as the measures fit with current situation and long term vision of ASEAN, ASEAN Plus Three and East Asia.
Fourth. With the future vision of establishing a vibrant East Asian Community, Cambodia would suggest ASEAN Secretariat to review the valuable recommendations of East Asia Think Tank and East Asia Forum on deepening APT cooperation and to support the establishment of the East Asian community in the future.
Lastly, Cambodia would like to request the Plus Three countries to continuously provide technical supports and promote more investments into the ASEAN region; especially, the least developed ASEAN countries.
