JAKARTA, Indonesia — Southeast Asian international ministers vowed to finalize negotiations with China over a proposed pact aimed toward stopping conflicts within the disputed South China Sea of their annual retreat on Saturday in Indonesia’s capital.

Within the closing session of their two-day assembly, the ministers from the Affiliation of Southeast Asian Nations additionally agreed to unite of their strategy to implement a five-step settlement made in 2021 between ASEAN leaders and Myanmar’s navy chief, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, that seeks to finish that nation’s worsening disaster.

China and the ASEAN member states, which embody 4 rival claimants to territories within the South China Sea, have been holding sporadic talks for years on a “code of conduct,” a set of regional norms and guidelines aimed toward stopping a conflict the disputed waters.

Indonesian Overseas Minister Retno Marsudi mentioned that Indonesia, this 12 months’s ASEAN chair, is able to host extra rounds of negotiations over the proposed pact, the primary of which shall be held in March. She mentioned ASEAN members are dedicated to concluding the discussions “as quickly as doable.”

“Members are additionally dedicated to advertise implementation of a declaration of conduct,” Marsudi added.

Marsudi didn’t elaborate, however previously, China has accused Washington of meddling in what it calls an Asian dispute. The U.S. has deployed ships and jets to patrol the waters to advertise freedom of navigation and overflight. It has usually raised alarm over China’s assertive actions, together with its building of islands the place it has positioned weapons together with surface-to-air missiles.

Sidharto Suryodipuro, head of ASEAN Cooperation at Indonesia’s Overseas Ministry, advised reporters in Jakarta that ASEAN member states will push negotiations this 12 months and discover new approaches.

“All of us agreed that it needs to be an efficient implementable in accordance with worldwide regulation, and the code of conduct should fulfill this standards,” Suryodipuro mentioned, including that Indonesia goes to contain extra international locations moreover China within the negotiation course of.

“It’s an exploratory stage. We don’t know what form it should take, however as you understand negotiation is a key course of that’s one thing we intend to accentuate,” he mentioned.

China has come beneath intense criticism for its militarization of the strategic waterway however says it has the precise to construct on its territories and defend them in any respect prices.

Vietnam, one of many 4 ASEAN claimant states, has been vocal in expressing considerations over China’s transformation of seven disputed reefs into man-made islands, together with three with runways, which now resemble small cities armed with weapons methods.

ASEAN members Cambodia and Laos, each Chinese language allies, have opposed using robust language towards Beijing within the disputes.

Indonesia shouldn’t be among the many governments difficult China’s declare to just about your complete South China Sea however expressed opposition after China claimed a part of Indonesia’s unique financial zone within the northern area of the Natuna Islands.

The sting of the unique financial zone overlaps with Beijing’s unilaterally declared “nine-dash line” demarking its claims within the South China Sea.

On the Myanmar problem, Marsudi advised a information convention Saturday that ASEAN international ministers reiterated the pressing want for Myanmar’s navy junta to implement the five-point consensus, saying it’s “essential for ASEAN.”

On Friday, the ministers urged Myanmar’s navy rulers to scale back violence and permit unhindered supply of humanitarian assist to pave the way in which for a nationwide dialogue aimed toward ending the disaster.

Myanmar can be an ASEAN member, however its international minister was excluded from Friday’s annual ministers’ retreat due to his nation’s failure to implement the five-step consensus.

Marsudi mentioned the ministers agreed that an inclusive nationwide dialogue “is vital to discovering a peaceable decision to the state of affairs in Myanmar,” and that decreasing violence and offering humanitarian help are “paramount for constructing belief and confidence.”

She mentioned the dearth of progress in Myanmar “assessments our credibility” as a gaggle, and that ASEAN’s efforts towards peace could be coordinated with these of different international locations and the United Nations.

Myanmar’s navy chief promised within the five-point settlement to permit a particular ASEAN envoy to fulfill with jailed ousted chief Aung San Suu Kyi and others to foster a dialogue aimed toward easing the disaster, set off by the navy’s seizure of energy two years in the past.

However Myanmar refused to let an ASEAN envoy meet with Suu Kyi final 12 months, leading to Min Aung Hlaing’s exclusion from an ASEAN summit final November.

“The general public ought to anticipate that Indonesia might present recent air for locating a political resolution to the worsening battle in Myanmar,” mentioned Dinna Prapto Raharja, a world relations analyst from Synergy Insurance policies, an impartial suppose tank.

“The fragmentation of energy in Myanmar is worse and so managing the violence has develop into extra advanced,” she mentioned.

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Related Press author Edna Tarigan contributed to this report.