Phnom Penh: Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn has had a busy couple of days. He spent Tuesday co-chairing the second Mekong-US Partnership Ministerial Meeting alongside US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The virtual meeting reviewed the progress of cooperation since the 1st Mekong-U.S. Partnership meeting last September. On Monday, the Foreign Minister also attended the 54th ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting, where Myanmar was at the top of the agenda.
The 54th ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting held virtually on Monday, attended by Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn, was a follow-up to the ASEAN Leaders’ meeting conducted back in April. ASEAN Foreign Ministers have now agreed to “work expeditiously” to implement their Five-Point Consensus on Myanmar, particularly in launching the mission of their Special Envoy, likely to be Brunei’s Second Foreign Minister Erywan Yusof, although Myanmar has yet to indicate whether he would be acceptable.
While approval is awaited, ASEAN Foreign Ministers have agreed to begin delivering humanitarian assistance through the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance in response to the Covid-19 outbreak in Myanmar.
The crisis in the country was also high on the agenda for Tuesday’s Mekong-US Partnership Ministerial Meeting co-chaired by Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn and his US counterpart, Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Ahead of the meeting, Blinken said he had “grave concerns” about Myanmar and called on ASEAN to take joint action to urge the military to restore Myanmar’s path to democracy. He also encouraged the Myanmar regime to accept the appointment of ASEAN’s special envoy so that negotiations on Myanmar’s future could begin.
The Mekong-US Partnership meeting comes amid a cooling of tensions between Phnom Penh and Washington. They escalated back in June when the US complained it had not been granted “full access” to the Ream Naval Base, but last week, after the arrival of the Johnson & Johnson vaccines, donated by Washington, Prime Minister Hun Sen called the US a “friendly country”, along with China, Japan and the UK, for its help in providing vaccines to the kingdom.
