Chan Chun Sing: Asean can learn from Middle-East woes

Singapore

SINGAPORE and Asean can draw a lesson from the unstable situation in the Middle East that a region needs to have cohesion if it does not want to be a platform for proxy contests by major powers, said Minister for Trade and Industry Chan Chun Sing.

The intra-regional rivalry and lack of unity in the Middle East - together with its strategic location and abundant energy resources - have made it a proxy battleground for extra-regional powers, he said at the annual conference of the Middle East Institute of the National University of Singapore on Monday.

The Middle East through its long history has seen attempts to dominate it by people as diverse as the Eg…