Washington’s interests will dominate US-ASEAN summit

Significance

The event was originally due to take place in March but was postponed because some South-east Asian leaders could not attend on the scheduled dates. Washington and ASEAN are approaching the meeting with contrasting agendas.

Impacts

• Washington will give a detailed briefing on its Indo-Pacific Economic Framework to make up for not having this ready in time for the summit.
• The meeting may give an idea of how Washington, Tokyo, Delhi and Canberra will try to reach out to ASEAN at the Quad summit later in May.
• Japan may have a key role in softening any pressure that Washington applies on ASEAN to take a tough stand against Moscow and Beijing.