VIENTIANE, LAO PDR, Sunday 24 April 2016 – The ASEAN Defence Senior Officials’ Meeting (ADSOM) convened yesterday at the Vientiane, Lao PDR. The meeting was chaired by Major General Onesy Senesouk, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of National Defence, Lao PDR. The Head of Delegation from Brunei Darussalam is Datin Paduka Hajah Suriyah binti Haji Umar, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Defence as the Brunei Darussalam’s ADSOM Leader, and accompanied officers from the Directorate of Defence Policy.
The meeting was briefed on the progress of the ASEAN defence cooperation, and discussed and considered potential future cooperation that could further contribute towards the progress and wider development of the ADMM mechanism.
The meeting commended the efforts and progress of the initiatives spearheaded by Brunei Darussalam, which are the Establishment of a Direct Communications Link (DCL) in the ADMM Process for secure and effective communication and the ADMM Logistics Support Framework that provides a comprehensive and systematic approach to ensure smooth execution of logistical processes in multi-national operations. The Meeting also endorsed the Standard Operating Procedures of the DCL Phase 1, which recommended guidelines for the operationalisation of the DCL between all ten ASEAN Defence Ministers. On the Establishment of Logistics Support Framework initiative, the Meeting welcomed the outcomes of the Logistics Support Framework Table Top Exercise held on 25 to 26 January 2016 in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei Darussalam. As a result of the Table-Top Exercise deliberations, the ADSOM endorsed the Logistics Support Framework Manual.
On the cooperation within the ADMM-Plus framework, the Meeting considered and endorsed the new Co-chairs of the ADMM-Plus Experts’ Working Groups (EWG) for April 2017 – April 2020. Furthermore, the work done within the ADMM-Plus for these three years will culminate to four large exercises, where one of it, the ADMM-Plus Maritime Security and Counter Terrorism will take place in Brunei Darussalam and Singapore from 1 – 11 May 2016. With the increasing incidences of cyberattacks in this era of accelerated technological progress, the ADMM-Plus cooperation made further progress with the adoption of the Concept Paper on the Establishment of the Experts’ Working Group on the Cyber Security, an initiative put forward by the Republic of Philippines.
Preparations for the ADMM, scheduled for 25 May 2016 in Vientiane, were also discussed.
Brunei Darussalam had the opportunity to meet with the then-Minister of Defence who is currently the Vice President of the National Assembly, Lt General Sengnouane Sayalath during a courtesy call with all the ADSOM-Plus Leaders. Brunei Darussalam also conducted bilateral calls with the ADSOM Leader of Lao PDR as the Chairman of the meeting, as well as other ADSOM and ADSOM-Plus Leaders from China, Malaysia, Singapore, and United States.
The ADSOM-Plus Meeting commences today at the same venue, where the ADSOM-Plus Leaders will be briefed on the progress of the ADMM-Plus EWG, and will exchange views on the regional and international defence and security issues.