CICA: an Important Platform for Asian Security and Cooperation

Cheng Guoping   2014/5/20

The Fourth Summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures In Asia will be held on May 20th -21st and China will duly assume the 2014-2016 chairmanship. Founded in 1992, CICA has made substantial progress over the last 22 years. Firstly, its membership has since been expanded to include 24 member states and 13 observers and international organizations. The membership has covered all the Asian sub-regions. Second, CICA as an international institution has been well-developed with three-level mechanism regime, namely, summit, ministerial conference, and senior official committees. Third, the legal basis of CICA has been improved. So far, it has adopted a number of legal documents which have established consensus-based processes of discussions and debates. Fourth, CICA has identified confidence-building measures in five areas to which all parties can subscribe out of their own volition.

CICA has evolved from a barely known forum to an important regional platform for security dialogue, which proves that the purposes and ideas it upholds are consistent with the trends of the times and conforms to the will of the Asian people. CICA was instituted in the wake of the Cold War, when the decades-old security pattern was dismantled. CICA was born against the backdrop of peace and development. At the turn of the century, growing non-traditional security challenges had turned Asia into  a hot spot for the three evil forces(separatism, extremism, and terrorism) and other new threats and risks. Required by the times, CICA members have held three summits to call for eliminating terrorism, promoting civilizational dialogues with a view to creating an atmosphere of trust and coordination. CICA members have demonstrated a strong will to jointly uphold regional security and stability, playing a unique role in maintaining regional peace and tranquility in Asia.
Now that CICA has entered its third ten-year development phase, the security situation in Asia is still complicated. On the one hand, Asia is one of the most dynamic places in the world with great potential, offering plenty of opportunities for the collective rise of Asian states. On the other hand, destabilizing factors in this region has been increasingly salient: big power games have been shifting the regional geopolitical landscape; regional hot-spot issues are on the rise; traditional and non-traditional security issues have become inseparably intertwined. Regional states have been fully aware that they still have a long way to go and heavy tasks to take on in terms of maintaining Asian security and peace.

Off all the regional platforms and mechanisms for security dialogues, CICA has displayed the greatest potential and broadest prospects.  CICA members as a whole covers 90% of the Eurasian landmass, is home to 50% of world population, and accounts for one third of global GDP. Major members include China, Russia, India. Observers include influential international and regional organizations such as the United Nations. The great deal of attention CICA has attracted has shown that its role as the pan-Asian security forum has been appreciated by all members, and its commitment to building confidence and promoting dialogue and coordination has fully taken into account of the objective security situation and met the present security demands.

China is one of CICA’s founding members and actively involved in CICA dialogues and cooperation, substantially promoting its growth and progress. Chinese leaders attended all CICA summits. China has provided financial support to the CICA secretariat, and constructively taken part in formulating relevant documents, making due contributions to consolidating legal basis for CICA and implementing confidence measures in many areas.

In an increasingly complex regional and international situation, China’s decision to hold the summit has demonstrated its strong will and consistent determination in shouldering responsibilities for Asian security. China sets the theme for the summit as “strengthen dialogue, trust, and collaboration to jointly build a peaceful, stable, and cooperative Asia,” with a view to proposing a new security idea, constructing a new architecture for security cooperation, abandoning outdated concepts such as the Cold War mentality, power politics, and zero-sum game. China hopes to join hands with other Asian members to build a comprehensive and cohesive security environment to respond to new challenges in a spirit of solidarity, collaboration, and win-win cooperation.

The current security dilemma faced by Asian states is due to the following factors. The first one is the residual impact of outdated concepts such as the Cold War mentality, power politics, and zero-sum game, leading to the deficit in mutual trust and cooperation in terms of Asian security. The second one is the absence of a unifying mechanism for regional security cooperation in Asia and the fragmented regional and subregional cooperation mechanisms remain inadequate in the face of new challenges. Some of these mechanisms are flawed because they are not dominated by Asian states.

China thinks that in an increasingly informatized and globalized world, security has already become an all-encompassing concept, with its rich connotations going beyond military security and geographical boundaries. Against this backdrop, the new security concept with mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality, and coordination as its core elements should be further enriched.

As a responsible major power in the region, China hopes to make use of the summit to consult with all relevant parties on regional security and development, provide an important platform for dialogue and cooperation among regional states, substantially build the capacity of jointly addressing security threats and challenges, and contribute to Asia’s peace, stability, and mutually beneficial and win-win cooperation.