ASEAN pulls punches on China, Russia, Taiwan

South-East Asian leaders watered down strident criticisms of China’s regional belligerence, omitted any reference to Taiwan, and stripped out a demand for Russia to withdraw from Ukraine, all proposed by Australia, in their final statement.

With the ASEAN bloc split between allegiance to China and those at the front line of its behaviour, such as the Philippines, the final leaders’ statement removed several critical references to Beijing from the draft originally circulated by Australia.