Gulf states, China take centre stage at summit of Southeast Asian nations

Al Jazeera

28-05-2025

The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), China and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) agreed to 'chart a unified and collective path towards a peaceful, prosperous, and just future', following their meeting in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.
In a world roiled by United States President Donald Trump's threats of crippling tariffs and rising economic uncertainties, alternative centres of global power were on full display, with the GCC and China attending the ASEAN summit for the group's inaugural trilateral meeting on Tuesday.
In their joint statement released on Wednesday, the GCC – comprising Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates – China, and ASEAN members Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Brunei, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar said they were committed to enhancing economic cooperation.
Chief among that cooperation will be the promotion of free trade, the signatories said, adding they looked 'forward to the early completion of the GCC-China Free Trade Agreement negotiations' and the upgrading of the ASEAN-China free trade area.
'We reaffirm our collective resolve to work hand in hand to unleash the full potential of our partnership, and ensure that our cooperation translates into tangible benefits for our peoples and societies,' they said.
Malaysia's Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim – whose country is currently chair of ASEAN and hosted the summits – told a news conference that the US remains an important market while also noting that ASEAN, the GCC, and China collectively represent a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of $24.87 trillion with a total population of about 2.15 billion.
'This collective scale offers vast opportunities to synergise our markets, deepen innovation, and promote cross-regional investment,' Anwar said.
The prime minister went on to dismiss suggestions that the ASEAN bloc of nations was leaning excessively towards China, stressing that the regional grouping remained committed to maintaining balanced engagement with all major powers, including the US.
James Chin, professor of Asian studies at the University of Tasmania in Australia, told Al Jazeera that the tripartite meeting was particularly important for China, which is being 'given a platform where the US is not around'.
ASEAN and the GCC 'already view China as a global power', Chin said.
China's Premier Li Qiang, who attended the summit, said Beijing was ready to work with the GCC and ASEAN 'on the basis of mutual respect and equality'.
China will work with 'ASEAN and the GCC to strengthen the alignment of development strategies, increase macro policy coordination, and deepen collaboration on industrial specialisation,' he said.
Former Malaysian ambassador to the US Mohamed Nazri bin Abdul Aziz said China was 'quickly filling up the vacuum' in global leadership felt in many countries in the aftermath of Trump's tariff threats.
The economic future looks bright, Nazri said, for ASEAN, China and the Gulf countries, where economies are experiencing high growth rates while the US and European Union face stagnation.
'The Gulf is very rich, ASEAN is a tiger, China… I cannot even imagine where the future lies,' Nazri said.
Jaideep Singh, an analyst with the Institute of Strategic & International Studies in Malaysia, said ASEAN's trade with GCC countries has been experiencing rapid growth.
Total trade between ASEAN and the Gulf countries stood at some $63bn as of 2024, making GCC the fifth-largest external trading partner of the regional bloc, while Malaysia's trade with the GCC grew by 60 percent from 2019 to 2024.
In terms of foreign direct investment, FDI from GCC countries in ASEAN totalled some $5bn as of 2023, of which $1.5bn went to Malaysia alone, Singh said.
However, the US, China, Singapore and the EU still make up the lion's share of FDI in Malaysian manufacturing and services.
Even as China's trade with ASEAN grows, economist say, the US still remains a huge market for regional countries.
In early 2024, the US took over China as ASEAN's largest export market, with 15 percent of the bloc's exports destined for its markets, up nearly 4 percent since 2018, said Carmelo Ferlito, CEO of the Center for Market Education (CME), a think tank based in Malaysia and Indonesia.
'The US is also the largest source of cumulative foreign direct investment in ASEAN, with total stock reaching nearly $480bn in 2023 – almost double the combined US investments in China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan,' Ferlito said.
Israel's war on Gaza was also highlighted at the ASEAN-GCC-China meeting on Tuesday.
Delegates condemned attacks against civilians and called for a durable ceasefire and unhindered delivery of fuel, food, essential services, and medicine throughout the Palestinian territory.
Supporting a two-state solution to the conflict, the joint communique also called for the release of captives and arbitrarily-detained people, and an end to the 'illegal presence of the State of Israel in the occupied Palestinian territory as soon as possible'.
The civil war in Myanmar was also a focus of the talks among ASEAN members at their summit on Tuesday, who called for an extension and expansion of a ceasefire among the warring sides, which was declared following the earthquake that struck the country in March. The ceasefire is due to run out by the end of May. However, human rights groups have documented repeated air attacks by the military regime on the country's civilian population despite the purported temporary cessation of fighting.
Zachary Abuza, professor of Southeast Asia politics and security issues at the Washington-based National War College, said that while Prime Minister Anwar may be 'more proactive' – in his role as ASEAN chair – in wanting to resolve the conflict, Myanmar's military rulers were 'not a good faith actor' in peace talks.
'The military has absolutely no interest in anything resembling a power-sharing agreement,' he said.