JAKARTA, June 15 (Xinhua) -- As an international tribunal in the Netherlands is expected to rule in a case brought by the Philippines against China on the South China Sea dispute, experts in Indonesia have called on retaining good relationship between ASEAN and China.
"(The dispute) should not become a problem of ASEAN as an organization," Connie Rahakundini, the president of Indonesian Institute for Maritime Studies (IIMS), told Xinhua recently.
Connie warns that the "ASEAN plus" mechanism is prone to be used as a forum to intervene and meddling of those who have interests in the South China Sea. "ASEAN becomes the one who is pulled in into this issue which it should not."
"ASEAN and China must find ways to keep their good relations amid this issue," she says, adding that the ten-country organization has already initiated a code of conduct which is believed to create a conducive situation among the claimants and restrain them from possible moves that may stall initiative to negotiate.
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