Building up and linking supply chains across Southeast Asian defense industries is crucial to becoming self-reliant in safeguarding the region from security threats, Malaysia’s defense chief said as he hosted a meeting of his ASEAN counterparts.
Minister Mohamed Khaled Nordin urged members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to ramp up partnerships across their defense industries in order to make themselves collectively less dependent on outside powers for military weapons and hardware, as they contend with security challenges such as disputes in the South China Sea.
“Advancing ASEAN’s defense industry is vital for reducing reliance on external suppliers and fostering regional self-reliance in defense acquisition and technological development,” he said in a speech at the ASEAN Defense Ministers’ Meeting Retreat in Penang on Wednesday.
“The long-term viability of these initiatives is reliant upon reinvigorating defense industry linkages among ASEAN Member States. In addition, strengthening defense supply chain resilience will also require new [pathways] such as possible adoption of harmonized standards in the region,” he said.
RELATED STORIES
2025 ASEAN chair Malaysia expected to revive bloc amid questions about neutrality
How ASEAN nations shape South China Sea policies around China
South China Sea: 5 things to watch in 2025
The Malaysian defense minister also called on the 10-member regional bloc to increase maritime patrols.
“Malaysia proposes that we increase our operations to ensure maritime security in our region because of the challenges in the South China Sea and the need for all of us to ensure freedom of navigation, uphold international law, and avoid turning this area into a battleground for superpower contestation,” Mohamed Khaled told reporters at the event.
“The region faces both traditional and non-traditional security threats that no single country can tackle alone,” he said.
Malaysia is among four ASEAN member-states that have overlapping claims in the potentially mineral- and gas-rich sea region. The Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei are the others.
For years, ASEAN and China – which claims nearly the entire South China Sea – have been negotiating a “code of conduct” for the waterway but still seem far from reaching an agreement.
When it came to his turn to speak, Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. said it was crucial for ASEAN states to be united in dealing with regional security threats.
“ASEAN has ensured the longest period of peace in any region since World War II. However, this peace is now under threat – not due to our incapacity to preserve it, but because of the absence of unanimity on key issues,” Teodoro told his regional counterparts.
“Silence in the face of violations diminishes ASEAN.”
He called on ASEAN members to strengthen regional cooperation by expanding joint maritime patrols, exercises and intelligence sharing among the bloc’s defense forces, while rejecting “external attempts to sow division within Southeast Asia” – an apparent dig at China.
Lately, bilateral tensions have been high amid standoffs between the two countries in South China Sea waters in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.
The South China Sea dispute is not just a domestic or regional concern but a “global issue” that affects international stability, Teodoro said.
“At the heart of this matter is the existential right of smaller states – ASEAN member-states in particular – to live in peace, secure their borders, and pursue their own destiny,” Teodoro said.
Collaborative security efforts, such as the 2017 Trilateral Cooperative Agreement among the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia – which focuses on maritime security collaboration in the Sulu and Sulawesi Seas – should be further developed to address regional concerns, the Philippine defense chief said.
Teodoro also said ASEAN should take more proactive measures in defending international law and norms.
“We should resist coercion in whatever form and exchange information on foreign activities that are inimical to our national interests, such as online scams, trafficking in persons, illegal migration, which destroy the fabric of our respective societies,” Teodoro said.
For several years, scam-center operations have flourished largely unimpeded in various parts of Southeast Asia – such as Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar – where hundreds of victims of human traffickers have been forced to work defrauding people online and over the telephone.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news outlet.