THE SARS OUTBREAK

Asean and China - United in Adversity

A summit gathering Asean and China outlines a common assault on the deadly virus ravaging Asia. The cooperation could herald a turning point, but it won't be plain sailing

By Michael Vatikiotis/BANGKOK

Issue cover-dated May 08, 2003

IT TOOK A GATHERING of Asian leaders and a tidal wave of global concern, but in the end, China's leadership grasped the point. "We have already learned our lesson," China's Prime Minister Wen Jiabao told a press conference in Bangkok after the April 29 meeting. With these words, the dapper premier expressed a modest degree of regret for the way China has handled the atypical pneumonia outbreak that has brought severe economic hardship to much of Asia. In the process he laid the foundations for the return of confidence in Asia and set a new tack for China's relationship with the rest of the region.

Hastily convened, the Bangkok summit on Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or Sars, brought the leaders of the 10-strong Association of Southeast Asian Nations together with China and its hard-hit territory, Hong Kong, at a time of high anxiety in the region about the spread of the virus that causes Sars. The disease, a virulent form of pneumonia, has killed more than 350 people worldwide. Remarkably, given the tendency for Asian summits to generate more rhetoric than action, there was agreement, in the words of the final communique, on "collective responsibility to implement stringent measures to control and contain the spread of Sars and the importance of transparency in implementing these measures."

Among the concrete measures agreed on at a meeting between the Asean leaders: standardized health screening for all travellers in the region, which envisages issuance of health certificates declaring people free of Sars before they can leave the country. Also, information about those infected with Sars, and where they are, will be shared. In a statement after separate talks between Asean and China, Beijing said it "associates itself with the measures proposed by the Asean declaration."

While that might seem like a half-hearted endorsement, top Thai businessman Sarasin Viraphol suggests that it would have been difficult for a Chinese leader to totally embrace the measures decided by the Asean leaders because that would have been perceived in China as an act of submission.

The Asean leaders also called for enhanced cooperation with the World Health Organization, which has been leading the worldwide battle against Sars. The United Nations agency, in a press statement, welcomed the "unprecedented efforts" made by Asean to jointly tackle Sars. "Meetings of this level and magnitude, to form a common strategy against a specific disease, show how serious countries are to become free of Sars," said WHO official David Heymann, who addressed the Bangkok meeting.

But some Asean officials foresee problems ahead because of the makeshift nature of the agreement and the speed with which it was put together. They worry in particular that the less-developed countries, like Burma, Cambodia and Laos, will have problems implementing the sophisticated screening measures called for. "There wasn't enough time to hammer out details," complains one official.

Others fear bureaucratic and financial problems will crop up. China tossed in 10 million renminbi ($1.2 million) to launch a special fund to study and devise measures to prevent Sars. But this struck some observers as a token gesture, along with Thailand's $250,000 contribution and $100,000 pledged by Cambodia. Japan, which might have been expected to contribute a generous amount, does not have a Sars problem and was not invited to the meeting.

And analysts note that while Wen Jiabao's apparent candour and openness impressed his neighbours, he must still answer to a collective leadership in Beijing stung by the political fallout from Sars.

It was Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong's initiative to bring the leaders together. Speaking to the REVIEW in Singapore just ahead of the meeting, Goh described how he called Malaysia's Acting Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and Cambodian Premier Hun Sen, this year's Asean chairman, to canvass a high-level meeting on Sars. "Once they agreed that we should have such a meeting, I, of course, took the initiative of calling up all the other leaders, more or less acting as, shall we say, the coordinator for this."

Singapore also took the lead in framing the agenda, pushing for the implementation of screening and shared information on the movement of people infected with Sars. Singapore argued that effective screening and contact-tracing of those infected with Sars was vital to keep borders open. In the weeks ahead, Singapore will also push for more effective screening based on a valid diagnostic test. "At the moment, they're just sticking a thermometer into your ear, not very accurate," Goh explains. "But in two to three weeks' time, we hope there will be this diagnostic kit which can detect whether you have Sars virus or not within an hour."

This kind of screening regionwide, will impose delays at airports and further disrupt the travel industry and related industries. But the Asean leaders agreed that preventing the spread of Sars was critical to salvaging the region's image.

Bringing Beijing in was a key objective because, while the WHO says Sars appears to have peaked elsewhere in the region, the number of cases in China is continuing to rise. According to Thai Premier Thaksin it did not take long for Wen to confirm his attendance at the Bangkok summit, making his first overseas trip since assuming the premiership in March. "I decided in a very resolute manner to attend this summit because I dare to face the whole world on this issue," Wen told the media, clearly aware that the spotlight was on him and China's tardy response to Sars.

Diplomats were careful not to cast the meeting as a forum for criticizing China, but instead saw collective political action as a way to coax Beijing into closer cooperation with the region on Sars. It amounted to a gentle nudge.

The strategy called for the Asean leaders to first agree on a set of resolutions and measures, and then for China to sign on. In the meeting, it was Singapore's Goh who urged China to associate itself with the measures called for by the Asean leaders. "The spirit of cooperation was very good. Wen Jiabao was very open," a beaming Thaksin told the REVIEW afterwards.

With levels of Sars infection flattening elsewhere in the region, Beijing's response has brought relief to business people who remain concerned about how the virus will run its course in China. "Until I have a better picture of how long it will take for China to get an approval rating, it's still a huge problem," comments Ho Kwon Ping, a Singaporean hotel developer and chairman of the Banyan Tree Group. "For governments to react within a month is something to be encouraged by."

And despite the likely problems in implementing the measures, Asean leaders for now are crowing about a new chapter in regional cooperation. Not only do they sense that the health crisis has reinvigorated their association, it has also served to equalize relations with China. "I think it could initiate a new dynamic. In the past, relations tended to be a bit more formal," says Goh. "It may be the start of a new relationship between leaders in East Asia."

For Wen, who waded into the epicentre of the crisis soon after taking up his post, the lesson he appeared to take away from the meeting was that action speaks louder than words. "A dozen documents are not as effective as one action," he told the media. Perhaps rashly, he predicted that China, along with the rest of the region, would have Sars contained within two months.