ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews EU-ASEAN counter-terrorism projects initiated and implemented between 2012 and 2017. To do so, it analyses the potential and de facto actorness of the EU in this policy field with an emphasis on the impact of ASEAN's perceptions of the EU as a counter-terrorism actor. It is shown that, amid a long history of terrorist and insurgent activity in Southeast Asia, an absent sense of urgency among ASEAN representatives has resulted in missing collective counter-terrorism structure which the EU could tap into. This little opportune environment is met with deficiencies on the EU's side to put existing resources into practice. Accordingly, perceptions of the EU as a serious counter-terrorism actor are virtually absent among ASEAN representatives. As a consequence of the above, interregional cooperation in this policy field has remained at a very basic level. Both the EU-ASEAN Border Management Programme (BMP) and an ASEAN Regional Forum Inter-Sessional Meeting on Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime (ARF ISM CTTC) are found to be minimal in size and scope. In sum, the chapter traces how a lack of demand on the ASEAN side, combined with constrained EU capabilities, has resulted in negative or absent perceptions of the EU by ASEAN, preventing meaningful cooperation in this field. The emergence of the “Islamic State” (IS) is analysed to be a potential game-changer in this regard.
