ASEAN+3, FX Swaps & U.S. Foreign Policy
Finance ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as well as China, Japan and South Korea agreed yesterday on the minimum scale of a regional foreign reserve swap.
"We also agreed that the total size of the multilateralized CMI would be at least US$80 billion," finance chiefs from the 10-member ASEAN and three East Asian countries said in a joint statement after concluding a meeting under the framework called ASEAN+3 yesterday. (link to article)
One more example of the stuff going on in Asia while the U.S. is occupied playing in the sandbox of the Middle East. The article above is a good read also on the basics of the Chiang Mai Initiative, ASEAN financial issues, and why all of this is the direct result of the Asian Financial Crisis.
I couldn’t agree more that the US’ relative lack of participation in east asian economic regionalism is scary. We keep trying to push matters through APEC, which does very little, compared to the relationship building and economic integration taking place in ASEAN+3. We have politicians campaigning platforms of erecting barriers to free trade while countries in Asia, which are widely considered to constitute the growth region of the next 30 years, are eliminating barriers to intra-regional trade. The result will be a decrease in US economic power in the region and the competitiveness of US businesses in the region, and perhaps the world. Sigh…