Australia’s under-investment in ASEAN is about them, not us

I was delighted Australia hosted the ASEAN leaders last week at a summit in Melbourne. It was the latest in a long list of initiatives and events that have demonstrated Australia’s value to South-East Asia as a regional partner.

The Menzies’ government brought a generation of students from South-East Asia to study in Australian universities, it successfully intervened in both the Malayan Emergency and Konfrontasi; the Howard government gave critical financial support to Indonesia and Thailand during the Asian economic crisis in 1998, it helped Indonesia rebuild after the 2004 tsunami, it helped end the long-standing East Timor crisis, it took Australia into the East Asia Summit and negotiated the Lombok security treaty with Indonesia: and the Hawke government helped set up APEC and Paul Keating made numerous speeches about “engagement with Asia”.