ABSTRACT
Twenty-five years after the establishment of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (AS BAN) in 1967, the fourth summit meeting held in Singapore in January 1992 made a bold decision to create an ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) to be completed in fifteen years (by the year 2008), starting from January 1993. Two years later the 27th meeting of the ASEAN economic ministers, advanced the completion target to the year 2003. Some members of the ASEAN proposed to advance the schedule to the year 2000, but this proposal was, however, rejected. It is generally acknowledged that ASEAN's accomplishments in the field of politics have been significant but, on the other hand, its achievements in the field of economic cooperations have been limited. Until a few years ago, an open discussion on economic cooperations was discouraged by ASEAN leaders. For instance, at the third ASEAN summit meeting in Manilla in 1987, the words 'free trade' were anathema for Indonesia, the largest member of ASEAN, which for long was the main obstacle to the progress of intra-ASEAN economic cooperations (Pangestu 1995: 38).
