Myanmar and the European Union as the Chairman of the ASEAN Regional Forum Defence Officials’ Dialogue (ARF) DoD, has organized a series of meetings of the ARF Defence Officials ‘ Dialogue (DOD) and the ARF Inter-sessional Support Group Meeting on Confidence Building Measures and Preventive Diplomacy (ISG CBM and PD) in Brussels, Belgium from 7-9 April 2014. The meeting was attended by the entire DoD participants of the ARF and ASEAN Secretariat, except Laos, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and North Korea. Indonesia’s Government delegation led by Defense Ministry International Cooperation Director, the Assistant Deputy of ASEAN Cooperation, Coordination and the Political Security Directorate representatives from ASEAN Foreign Ministry, Maritime Security Coordination Board and staff of the Indonesian Embassy in Brussels.
The ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) Defense Officials ‘ Dialogue (DOD) led by Myanmar and the European Union as the Co-Chairs the ARF DOD was opened by Brigadier General Walter Huhn, the European External Action Service. Thus, the European Union conveyed about the necessity of the maritime cooperation which oriented in action. In the opening, he stressed that as the high-level interaction between the ARF defence policy officials, the DOD has contributed to confidence building that aimed at maintaining the peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region. The acknowledgment that the ARF has provided significant progress in cooperation in non-traditional security, and reaffirmed that ASEAN remains the primary driving force in the ARF and ASEAN way of dialogue, consultation and consensus remains the guiding principles for the ARF
Meanwhile, Major-General Tin Maung Win, the Deputy Chief of the Armed Forces Training Office of the Republic of The Union of Myanmar welcomed the Eu’s willingness to become the host the meeting of the ASEAN Regional Forum of Defense Officials ‘ Dialogue (DOD ARF) today, which was carried out in back to back with the meeting of the ARF Inter-Session Support Group on Confidence Building Measures and Preventive Diplomacy. Therefore, the main agenda discussed in this meeting related issues : Maritime Security, the role of the Military in Disaster Relief and the presentation of the European Defence Agency on Europe’s Defence Technology and Industrial Base (EDTIB). Furthermore, the meetings took great care over the non-traditional security issues in regional areas, such as illegal fishing, piracy and disaster relief operation.
At the end of the meeting, the UE and Myanmar delivered their appreciation for the active participation from the audience. Also, they explained that the issues of non-tradisional of maritime security was the international threat so that the need of understanding and thrust to build the cooperation related to the maritime security and piracy in order to achieve the stability and peacefulness. In conclusion, the meeting was run well and according to the schedule and all parties were agree to run the cooperation between countries.
