ABSTRACT
Perhaps the most remarkable feature about ASEM is the punctual manner in which Asian and European leaders have met at the summit level. They have gathered with the regularity of a Swiss clock, every two years since 1996. There were neither institutional constraints nor compelling agenda requirements forcing them to do so. Nor can it be said that these meetings were always self-evident and easygoing. Quite the contrary in fact. What this demonstrates, then, is that leaders from Asia and Europe are keen to periodically confront their perceptions of world developments and to review the state of Asia-Europe relations. The regularity of ASEM summits, it can be said, is itself a statement.
