1. Regional Security and Multilateral Cooperation

·New challenges to Asia’s security in the new situation

· The consequences of September 11, 2001 leave no nation untouched.

· The presence of or ambition for weapons of mass destruction continues to underlie regional and global tensions. The multilateral disarmament and arms control regime is under pressure.

· The United Nations faces significant challenges, in particular to its role of promoting international peace and security.

· The Pacific region continues to face problems and stresses.

· In East Asia, China’s re-emergence as a major economic and political power in the region is helping to drive far-reaching changes in the region’s economic and political architecture.

· The international trade environment remains uncertain.

The New Zealand Labour Party supports a one-China policy and urges restraint and a peaceful resolution of cross-straits tension.

North Korea’s proclaimed nuclear weapons programme is a major concern. We urge North Korea to resume its cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency and its commitment to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The current 6-party dialogue process is a positive way forward. We commend China for facilitating this.

·New security concept and regional security cooperation

If we are to defeat terrorism, regional cooperation is imperative. In the Asia Pacific region, a concerted response to terrorism is now at the centre of the Asian Regional Forum agenda, and becoming increasingly important in APEC.

Today New Zealand is active in cooperating with Asian partners in the new threats to stability — terrorism, people smuggling, trans-national crime and the longer-term problems of environmental degradation and growing pressures on natural resources.

New Zealand is aware that while we focus on the symptoms of terrorism, the international community must work together to tackle the conditions that foster it.

·New types of partnership and new order in Asia

Asia is no longer a foreign and little known place. Many of our consumer products are sourced from Asia, and Asia today is the destination for a third of our exports. Tourism and international education, as well as migration, have given us a large and visible Asian presence.

New Zealand has been a solid contributor to regional organisations such as the Asian Regional Forum and APEC, building a reputation as a partner nation with interests in the affairs of the region.

2. Economic Growth and Social Progress

·Economic globalisation and Asia’s economic and social development

The importance of the Asia-Pacific region as a driving force of the global economy is neatly captured in the theme Chile as APEC host has set this year-“One Community, Our Future”. APEC is strategically important to New Zealand bridging two emerging regional blocs — East Asia and the Americas. This year’s Summit is an opportunity to renew high-level contacts with leaders, to maintain emphasis on counter-terrorism and other security issues including non-proliferation.

APEC has an important role to play in supporting progress in the WTO.

The WTO is truly global. With 148 members, most of the world economy is now covered by multilateral rules.

Why is the multilateral system important? Because of a variation on the “three Rs”:

Returns — the world economy stands to gain most from genuine progress in multilateral trade liberalisation;

Rules — establishing and sustaining a rules based system to govern global trade;

Resolution — the ability for large and small alike to defend their interests through enforcement of those rules.

The Doha Round is equivalent to bilateral negotiations among 148 economies.

Nothing can match the returns to the world economy from genuine progress in trade liberalisation at the multilateral level.

China is New Zealand’s fourth largest trading partner, and we were the first country to support China’s accession to the WTO. Under the agreement to work towards an FTA, New Zealand recognises that China has established a market economy.

·Regional economic cooperation and common prosperity

In June this year New Zealand’s Prime Minister and Leader of the Labour Party Helen Clark announced the New Zealand and China had agreed on a formal Trade and Economic Co-operation Framework, a key feature of which is an agreement to negotiate an FTA. And as the world’s fastest growing major economy and New Zealand’s fourth largest trading partner, we believe that an FTA with China would unlock significant trade and investment potential for both countries.

We live in an increasingly complex and unpredictable geo-political environment, and as relatively small economies Australia and New Zealand must work hard to become part of the “emerging regional architecture”.

China has played a central role in moves to regional integration, both directly and indirectly. China has reached out to its near neighbours, as well as to Australia, New Zealand and beyond. And its dynamic growth has prompted a competitive response from those neighbours, particularly ASEAN, to work on deepening their own integration, and to seek bilateral links more widely.

3.Political Party Building and National Development

·Role of political parties in the modernisation process of Asian countries

For many countries, including some in our own Asia-Pacific region, human rights violations and constraints on democratic participation persist. So far, neither sanctions nor persuasion has produced the desired result.

Perhaps the most fundamental change, which will impact on countries in Asia as they go through the modernisation process, is the growth of a larger, educated middle class. Such people have better communication with the rest of the world. Changes in human rights will take place within the context of a market economy in a globalising world.

·Responsibilities of political parties to their countries and peoples

National governments have the primary responsibility to address the absence of basic social and economic rights. The Labour Party has always been active in promoting development assistance, with a particular project currently being run in Vietnam through the Labour Women’s Council.

·The political features of Asian political parties and Asian political civilisation

People in countries with more than 2000 years of recorded history — like China, India or Vietnam — have a very different mind-set to a young country like New Zealand.

New Zealanders are impatient for results, but they invest in relationships for the long term, value cooperation and collaboration, and look for consistency in policy and practice.

The New Zealand Labour Party sees assiduous cultivation of personal and institutional relationships within our means as key to achieving our objectives. Contracts and treaties have their place in international business and diplomacy but they are not sufficient nor will they be effective without the foundation of personal or institutional commitment to the relationship.

Knowledge and understanding are critical to effectiveness in relationships, especially in Asia. We New Zealanders need to do more listening and learning, not just selling and telling. We need to do better in integrating Asia into our school curricula, in developing our own research capabilities on Asian issues, and in teaching Asian languages.

We need to draw on the wisdom and experiences of our own Asian communities to up-skill other New Zealanders. We must do more to support Asian settlers during their adjustment to a new life in New Zealand and to work with them to strengthen our knowledge of Asia and our connections in Asian countries.

The New Zealand Labour Party has taken up the political challenge of ensuring that all New Zealanders are aware of the importance of this relationship and the contributions that migrants, students and tourists make to our country. We will continue to fight against the damage of populist and self-interested political appeals to ethnocentrism, which feed on ignorance.

A positive experience by all visitors and students of their life and education in New Zealand builds more goodwill for us in Asia than what could be achieved by almost any other means, as the Colombo Plan has shown.

·Party-to-party exchanges and state diplomacy

The Labour-led government maintains a busy schedule of political consultations with Asian countries at ministerial level, and we are looking to increase this at the Party level.

We are keen to promote further understanding with political parties in Asia who share similar aims to ours, and have welcomed a number of delegations from Asian countries to New Zealand.

It is the firm conviction of the New Zealand Labour Party that continuing to strengthen and deepen these contacts at the political Party level is also critically important to building the peaceful and prosperous Asia-Pacific region that all our citizens desire.