Press Releases: Deputy Secretary Sullivan’s Meeting With ASEAN Foreign Ministers
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The below is attributable to Spokesperson Heather Nauert:
Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan met on September 27 with Foreign Ministers and other senior representatives from the ten member countries of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) on the margins of the UN General Assembly in New York. The Deputy Secretary co-chaired the meeting with Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith of Laos, the ASEAN country coordinator for the United States.
The United States and ASEAN reaffirmed their strategic partnership and discussed the U.S. commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific region, in which independent nations with diverse cultures and aspirations can prosper side-by-side in freedom and peace. The Deputy Secretary also underscored the U.S. commitment to ASEAN centrality and to upholding international law, including the freedom of navigation, in the South China Sea and commended ASEAN’s efforts to implement fully UN Security Council Resolutions on North Korea.
The Deputy Secretary and ASEAN representatives agreed that the past 41 years of U.S.-ASEAN partnership have led to numerous successes and committed to building upon this relationship at the upcoming U.S.-ASEAN and East Asia Summits from November 14-15 in Singapore.