Role Nowadays and Presence in the Media

Influence

The influence of ASEAN is growing in the Southeast of Asia, as a single entity, they would be the sixth largest economy in the world. That makes that countries like India and Australia are trying to stablish strong commercial and political relationships. For instance, the last ASEAN Summit was held in Australia, which is not a member of the Association. In this summit the Prime Minister of Australia, Malcolm Turnbull, made clear that they are working to improve the relationship with ASEAN and become “a family”. In fact, ASEAN has a free trade agreement with Australia and New Zealand, as well as with India and China, and they are planning to stablish more free trade deals with other countries of the region.

ASEAN is the heart of Souteast Asia, and being in a good relationship with them means having impact on a region that right now is a hot spot.


ASEAN in the Media

Although the media reports in ASEAN, especially when they celebrate summits, they focus more in the individual countries that form it. Sometimes they talk about Southeast Asian countries without taking into account that they belong to ASEAN.

Focusing on particular countries makes them specially critic with the Association since some of the member countries don’t totally respect human rights. For instance, the Rohingyas crisis in Myanmar. The ASEAN has a policy of no intervention in intern affairs of the members, so they are doing nothing about the Rohingyas refugees, expecting Myanmar to deal with it themselves.

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MIGRATION FLUXES IN THE ROHINGYA REFUGEE CRISIS

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Economic Indicators

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