REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA - US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton met with ASEAN Secretary General Dr Surin Pitsuwan and the ASEAN Committee of Permanent Representatives at the ASEAN Secretariat on Tuesday. Clinton and Pitsuwan discussed regional and global issues, including on South China Sea in the meeting. She is on a two-day visit to Indonesia starting Monday. This is her first visit to the ASEAN Secretariat, but her second visit to Jakarta after her first visit in 2009. 

"Along with our continued economic, strategic, and people-to-people engagement with ASEAN, the United States remains committed to supporting ASEAN`s evolution as the foremost regional institution promoting a vision of a peaceful, secure, prosperous, and democratic Southeast Asia," the US embassy on Tuesday said in a press statement on the visit of Hillary Clinton to the ASEAN Secretariat. 

On Monday evening, she held a bilateral meeting with Indonesian Foreign Affairs Minister Marty Natalegawa, and on Tuesday morning she paid a courtesy call on President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.  The United States has demonstrated its institutional support for ASEAN in a number of ways, according to the US embassy`s press statement.

In June 2010, the United States became the first non-ASEAN country to establish a dedicated Mission to ASEAN in Jakarta. Under the leadership of Ambassador David L Carden, the United States` first resident Ambassador to ASEAN, the Mission provides a venue for regular engagement and cooperation with ASEAN.

In addition to beginning recruitment for the US-ASEAN Fulbright Initiative this year, the United States supports both US and ASEAN Member States` scholars working on issues central to the region through symposia held at American University`s ASEAN Studies Center in Washington D.C. 

Besides, the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs` Assistant Secretary Kurt M Campbell holds monthly meetings with the ASEAN Washington Committee, composed of the ambassadors of ASEAN Member States resident in Washington. These meetings serve as a venue for communication and collaboration on issues and projects within the region.

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