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Fan Chen

If there is one big threat to maritime security in Southeast Asia, it is the growing wariness between the big players in the region.
That was the assessment from Kao Kim Hourn, secretary general of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), at the just-concluded Munich Security Conference.
“Overall the main threat would be the increasing strategic mistrust between and among the major powers,” he said during a panel on maritime security on Friday.
Kao did not refer to any country directly but both China and the United States have ramped up their naval presence in the South China Sea.
China claims most of the islands and rocks in the South China Sea and their adjacent waters, leading to persistent territorial disputes with Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei. Tension between Beijing and Manila has escalated sharply in recent years, sometimes resulting in clashes.

To counter China’s claims, the US has stepped up defence cooperation and conducted regular naval operations with its long-time treaty ally the Philippines, maintaining a strong presence in the area.
The most recent exercise was in January, when the first US-Philippine joint maritime operation of the year was carried out in contested waters. Beijing condemned the drills as undermining regional peace and stability and drawing in “external powers”.
On the same panel in Munich, Singaporean Defence Minister Chan Chun Sing said “political failure” was fuelling the disputes and that regional countries had to be careful not to become proxies for the bigger powers.
“States that are not successful or elements within those states become pawns in other people’s larger geopolitical game. They are just but proxies,” he said.
However, when asked about the growing US and Chinese naval presence in the region, Chan said Singapore did not “see it as a zero-sum game”.
He said the interests of Beijing and Washington converged as they both wanted to ensure the safety and security of ships going through the region.
“We think the US, China and other stakeholders that use the Strait of Malacca in the South China Sea have a shared interest to contribute, and they can contribute positively, provided we have a shared understanding of the framework.”
Chan added that the key maritime security challenge for the region was deciding on a set of international norms that aligned with the UN maritime legal framework.
Kao said Asean hoped that a South China Sea code of conduct between the 11-member bloc and China could be finalised this year and “bring down the tensions”.
The code of conduct has been under negotiations since the early 2000s as a way to manage tensions in disputed waters, but little concrete progress has been made.


The foreign ministers of China and Asean have agreed to finalise the framework this year, even as states remain deeply divided over whether it should be legally binding and the intended area of enforcement.
Beyond maritime security, Southeast Asian countries are still grappling with the fallout from the tit-for-tat tariff war last year between the world’s top two economies.
Former Indonesian ambassador to Washington Dino Patti Djalal stressed that a deep sense of uncertainty about the policies of US President Donald Trump still persisted in the region despite the truce with China.
“Even though there may be a new format or accommodation between the US and China, what will remain is the sense of mistrust, anxiety and even fear towards the Trump administration,” he said at a side event in Munich on Saturday.
The tariff negotiation process between Indonesia and the US felt “like a tributary relationship”, Djalal said.
“The things that were asked of us from the Trump administration were never asked of us [by] any country,” he said, without disclosing further details.


Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto is expected to sign a reciprocal tariff agreement during his state visit to Washington this week.
Jakarta now faces a 19 per cent import tariff from Washington, down from 32 per cent in Trump’s initial announcement in April last year.
Most major Southeast Asian countries initially faced aggressive US tariff threats of up to 49 per cent under Trump’s “Liberation Day” policy announced last April 2, but eventually negotiated lower “reciprocal” rates in exchange for market access and trade concessions.
The “very strong game of one-upmanship” between China and the US would cost Trump, Djalal warned.
“The countries that President Trump is clobbering are coming together … This is a trend that will continue for the rest of the Trump administration,” he said, citing Brics as an example.
Indonesia officially joined Brics as a full member in 2025, becoming the first Southeast Asian nation to join the bloc that sees itself as a counterweight to the Western-led global order.


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South China Sea

Why big power rivalry is the ‘main threat’ to Asean maritime security

Chinese coastguard vessels carry out a law enforcement drill in the South China Sea on February 4. Photo: Xinhua

Asean Secretary General Kao Kim Hourn says the 11-member bloc hopes that a code of conduct with China could be finalised this year and “bring down tensions”. Photo: AFP

Rubio, Wang Yi manage US-China great power rivalry in Munich even as core tensions linger

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Marco Rubio and Wang Yi with their respective delegations meet on Friday on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference. Photo: Pool via Reuters

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Illustration: Lau Ka-kuen

The US Army’s new presence in the Philippines and the push to contain China

Members of the US Army Rotational Force-Philippines and the Marine Rotational Force-Southeast Asia hold a meeting at Camp Aguinaldo in the Philippines on January 12. Photo: Handout

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Beijing has tried to drum up support among Southeast Asian diplomats following Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s (centre) comments about Taiwan in November. Photo: Reuters

First China-Philippines talks in over a year: is a South China Sea thaw in the offing?

Chinese and Philippine officials hold talks in Cebu on January 29. Photo: X/Chinaembmanila

The Chinese coastguard fires a water cannon at a Philippine vessel in the South China Sea on October 12. Photo: AP

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Smaller players ‘become pawns’ in a bigger geopolitical game as ‘strategic mistrust among major powers’ grows, Asean leaders say in Munich


Smaller players ‘become pawns’ in a bigger geopolitical game as ‘strategic mistrust among major powers’ grows, Asean leaders say in Munich.


Why big power rivalry is the ‘main threat’ to Asean maritime security

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Smaller players ‘become pawns’ in a bigger geopolitical game as ‘strategic mistrust among major powers’ grows, Asean leaders say in Munich

Smaller players ‘become pawns’ in a bigger geopolitical game as ‘strategic mistrust among major powers’ grows, Asean leaders say in Munich