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We hope that through these trade arrangements, through collaboration in training, in manpower development, and what have you, ASEAN in, say, ten years' time, will be a very different ASEAN.

Asean is obviously a very important association for us. Over the past 30 years Asean has made great strides in regional cooperation covering a number of areas, although recently it has been under strain because of the financial crisis and other challenges.

I would argue that Asean has been instrumental in driving both economic growth and political development, and that there can be no clearer example than its relations with Myanmar.

Asia's governments come in two broad varieties: young, fragile democracies - and older, fragile authoritarian regimes.

Assuming the chairmanship of ASEAN isn't going to do anything about improving the lives of people.

We will host the Asean summit in November this year. It will be an occasion to reflect on our achievements collectively and to look at how Asean can maintain its leading role in regional and international cooperation.

You are slowly developing some multinationals of your own. We certainly hope that some of them will look in this direction when they look for opportunities because the progress of Southeast Asia is important to China, just as China's progress is important to us.

Southeast Asia is an area in which there is a form of Islam which is both devout and progressive, and therefore to be supported. It's an area in which I see a congruence of American interests and local interests: to have tolerant societies and become more prosperous.

Unification is one thing, and stability in Northeast Asia is another thing.

Countries that managed to rebuild commanding state structures after popular nationalist revolutions - such as China, Vietnam, and Iran - look stable and cohesive when compared with a traditional monarchy such as Thailand or wholly artificial nation-states like Iraq and Syria.