Virtual summit: ASEAN leaders meet by video on pandemic
Hanoi
Forced apart by the coronavirus pandemic, Southeast Asian leaders linked up by video Tuesday to plot a strategy to overcome a crisis that has threatened their economies and kept millions of people in their homes under lockdowns.
The heads of state of the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations were to hold further talks later Tuesday, also through video conferencing, with their counterparts from China, Japan and South Korea who are expected to express their support in helping ASEAN fight the coronavirus. Vietnam, ASEAN’s leader this year, has postponed an in-person gathering tentatively to June.
“It is in these grim hours that the solidarity of the ASEAN community shines like a beacon in the dark,” Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said in an opening speech.
Containment efforts have placed the pandemic “actually under control,” he said, warning against complacency, with a number of member countries, including Indonesia and the Philippines, fearing spikes in infections after large-scale testing is conducted, The Associated Press reports.
Related Posts