The national flags of ASEAN member states. Photo: Internet

Twenty-eight years since officially joining the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on July 28, 1995, Vietnam's membership has left a profound mark with her positive contributions to the bloc’s common development, laying the foundation for the establishment of an ASEAN community with political unity, economic integration, and social responsibility sharing.

Vietnam's accession to ASEAN paved the way for other countries such as Laos, Myanmar, and Cambodia to join the association, turning ASEAN into a cooperative community regardless of political differences, VietnamPlus said.

With Vietnam's participation, the regional bloc entered a new era. Vietnam's role and contributions have been recognized in the process of shaping and forming ASEAN's strategies, directions, and development plans, especially in promoting regional cooperation with major partners such as the US, the European Union, China, and India.

In the current stage, Vietnam has made significant contributions in defining the goals, development orientations, and major policies of the bloc. The country has participated in building and adopting many important documents, including the ASEAN Vision 2020, ASEAN Charter, ASEAN Community Vision 2025, comprehensive roadmaps for building the community, and various other key pacts, especially those related to connectivity and narrowing development gaps.

According to Ambassador Vu Ho, Acting Head of ASEAN SOM (Senior Officials Meeting) Vietnam, the nation initiated many operational mechanisms of the association, some of which continue to be the core ones, for example, the establishment of the ASEAN Defence Ministers' Meeting-Plus (ADMM-Plus) in 2010, ASEAN-Plus mechanisms, the inclusion of Russia and the US in the East Asia Summit (EAS) in 2010, and the establishment of the ASEAN Community in 2015.

At the opening ceremony of the 37th ASEAN Summit and Related Summits hosted by Vietnam in 2020. Photo: baochinhphu.vn

Vietnam has held the ASEAN rotating chair position three times in 1998, 2010, and 2020. Especially in 2020, the country effectively led the association's activities from in-person to virtual meetings, with its flexibility and proactiveness helping ASEAN stand firm and overcome the difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2021, participating in the first post-COVID-19 in-person ASEAN Leaders' Meeting, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh presented a series of initiatives such as the plan to provide vaccines to the people, the establishment of the ASEAN Centre for Emergency Public Health Situations and Emerging Diseases, and promoting post-pandemic economic recovery and development, which demonstrated Vietnam's proactive and positive role.

Former ASEAN Secretary-General Dato Lim Jock Hoi praised Vietnam for showing strong leadership in leading a collective regional response to the pandemic.

Given complex global and regional developments, Vietnam has actively joined in the process of defining principles and "playing rules" for the region, thus together with ASEAN ensuring peace, security, stability, and promoting dialogue and cooperation. Vietnam has promoted the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia (TAC) to become the code of conduct for relationships between bloc member nations and with ASEAN's external partners. Vietnam has also made active contributions to the drafting and adoption of the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific (AOIP), helping shape the bloc’s common position and promote cooperation based on its values, principles, and centrality.

Regarding the South China Sea (Bien Dong) issue, Vietnam and other ASEAN member countries have engaged in the negotiation and signing of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC) between ASEAN and China; as well as negotiations for an effective and legally-binding Code of Conduct in the water (COC).

Cooperation with ASEAN has always been an important pillar in Vietnam's foreign policy of independence, self-reliance, diversification and multilateralisation, and international and regional integration over the past 28 years.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh speaks at the 42nd ASEAN Summit and related meetings in Indonesia this year. Photo: VNA

Talking to the Vietnam News Agency, Deputy Director of the Department of Asian, African, and Middle-East Studies under the International Relations Institute of Cambodia (IRIC) Uch Leang said Vietnam has made active and responsible contributions to strengthening and expanding solidarity in ASEAN over the past 28 years.

Director of the Canada-Vietnam Trade Council Elizabeth McIninch also stressed that given the current context of economies around the world facing post-pandemic difficulties, Vietnam's active role as a member of ASEAN is generating impressive momentum for the bloc.

The nation has truly become a mediator between bloc member countries and been playing a leading role in this community of 650 million people, she said.

McIninch described Vietnam, the second-largest labour market in ASEAN, as a politically stable country with optimistic people, a good education system, and a relatively young average age of around 30 years old.

Veeramalla Anjaiah, a senior research fellow at the Centre for Southeast Asian Studies (CSEAS) and senior journalist based in Jakarta, said over the past 28 years since joining ASEAN under the motto of an ‘active and responsible’ member, Vietnam has made several contributions to a united, peaceful, stable, and developed ASEAN that possesses a steady voice in the region.

Vietnam has therefore played a key role in defining development goals and directions, along with formulating major decisions within ASEAN, he noted. /.

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