ASEAN Civil Society Conference 2013 in Brunei
From April 6-8, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Civil Society Conference and ASEAN People's Forum 2013 (ACSC/APF 2013), with the theme "ASEAN: Building the Future Together", took place in the capital city of Banda Seri Begawan, Brunei.
The event is held to enhance understanding, connection and solidarity among people and cooperation between communities and governments in the bloc, towards the common goal of building the ASEAN Community by 2015.
(Source: Inquirer)
ACSC/APF 2013, organized by the Brunei Women's Council with the support of Civil Society Organizations (CSCs) in Brunei, attracted the participation of a large number of CSC representatives from ASEAN member countries.
In his opening remarks at the conference, Brunei's Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports, Pehin bin Haji Abdullah, said that the successful establishment of the ASEAN Community by 2015 depends significantly on the active participation and contribution of all people and civil society in ASEAN, including youth, women and non-governmental organizations, as well as on the coordination and cooperation between the government and all people and civil society.
He stressed that the government as well as all people and civil society in ASEAN need to focus their efforts to achieve common goals such as poverty eradication, promoting education, creating jobs, improving health care conditions and protecting a sustainable environment.
He pointed out that civil society can help narrow the gap in ASEAN through mutual assistance, cooperation, building ASEAN identity and regional cooperation networks to improve services for the poor, illiterate, sick and vulnerable. In addition, civil society can also cooperate in human resource development through education, training, technology, regional initiatives on disaster mitigation and people-to-people connectivity.
ACSC/APF has become an annual meeting of representatives of people and civil societies in the ASEAN region; a forum to raise and discuss multilateral issues in the bloc to strengthen solidarity, voices, concerns, requests and recommendations of all people and civil societies, towards a common home - the ASEAN Community in 2015.
The theme “ASEAN: Building the Future Together” of ACSC/APF 2013 was proposed by the host country to support the theme of the 2013 ASEAN Summit “Our People, Our Future.”
ACSC/APF 2013 with 8 plenary sessions focused on exchanging and discussing common issues such as building the future together, peace, mutual understanding, ASEAN vision and the participation of women and youth, and issues related to ACSC/APF such as the recommendation mechanism, participation in environmental protection and building the three pillars of politics-security, economy, culture-society of ASEAN, adopting the joint statement of ACSC/APF 2013 and transferring the task of organizing ACSC/APF to Myanmar, the country that will assume the role of ASEAN Chair in 2014./.
According to (TTXVN) - DT
