Page 2 of
2 Iran's star rises in the
East By Clive Parker
known oil reserves and has large
unexploited fields of natural gas. A US military
strike against Iran would inevitably lead to
spiking global fuel prices that would badly crimp
several Southeast Asian net-fuel-importing
economies.
"Southeast Asian countries need
energy; they are industrial countries," said
Mohsen Pak-Ayeen, Iran's ambassador to Thailand,
Myanmar and Laos, in a recent exclusive interview
with
Asia
Times Online in Bangkok. "Iran can provide [this]
for them."
Indeed, consider some recent
ASEAN-Iran trade and investment figures. The
Philippines, which relies heavily on oil imports
to meet its domestic energy needs, purchases
roughly 100,000 barrels of crude oil from Iran
every day. Meanwhile, Tehran has invested in total
more than $100 million in the Philippines'
petrochemical industry.
Thailand, Asia's
largest energy importer as a percentage of gross
domestic product, has likewise recently signed new
natural gas exploration deals through state-owned
PTTEP for Iranian resources. Iran recently agreed
to allow CementThai Chemicals Co to build a $200
million petrochemical plant in the southern
Iranian town of Assualuyeh, where Thailand will
take a 48% stake, Japan a 12% stake and Iran the
rest.
Iran has opened discussions with
Thai counterparts on the possibility of building
an oil refinery in Thailand, and have opened
preliminary discussions on a similar proposal for
Myanmar, according to Ambassador Pak-Ayeen. In
that direction, Iran recently introduced both
Thailand and Myanmar to its new-fangled
compressed-natural-gas converters for use in cars
and buses, and Pak-Ayeen believes that new
bilateral deals implementing the technology could
soon follow.
Both Southeast Asian
countries have already experimented with such
systems in a bid to reduce their dependence on
oil-based derivatives for their fuel needs.
Although Myanmar is one of the few ASEAN countries
that does not have full diplomatic relations with
Iran - which currently has full-blown diplomatic
missions in Brunei, Vietnam, the Philippines,
Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand - that could soon
change.
Myanmar Deputy Foreign Minister
Kyaw Thu is scheduled to go to Tehran for a
two-day visit this month to discuss among other
issues the possibility of establishing a mission
in Tehran, an arrangement that, if accepted, would
likely be reciprocated with the establishment of
an Iranian embassy in Myanmar. The two countries,
which have never shared full diplomatic relations,
now both targeted for sanctions by Washington,
have recently drawn closer together.
Myanmar and Iran "are always cooperating
with each other ... We have the same lobby at the
United Nations," Pak-Ayeen said. "The ambassadors
were discussing with each other daily" during
recent US attempts to sanction both countries at
the Security Council. Notably, Iran has remained
mum about Thai and Myanmar policies concerning
their minority Muslim populations. "Our priority
in Thailand and Myanmar is economic," said
Pak-Ayeen.
Iran is awaiting the formal
ratification of its proposal to become a fully
fledged ASEAN dialogue partner, a process that is
moving along "positively", according to Pak-Ayeen.
There is perhaps no better symbol of Iran's grand
designs for engaging Southeast Asia than the
shiny, new, huge $5 million embassy it opened in
Bangkok last year, replacing a more modest
facility it previously rented.
If new
compelling evidence emerges that Iran's
contentious nuclear program is indeed geared to
developing weapons of mass destruction, ASEAN
could turn against Tehran. Indonesian Foreign
Minister Hassan Wirajuda said last May when Iran
was beginning to come under Security Council
scrutiny: "Our position is that we support nuclear
development for peaceful purposes, especially
energy, but we consistently object to
nuclear-weapons proliferation." He made a similar
statement during US Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice's visit to Jakarta last year.
Iran
has since repeatedly assured its ASEAN partners
that they have nothing to fear and as recent as
last month invited Non-Aligned Movement members,
including Malaysia, to inspect its enrichment
facilities independently. So far those assurances
have convinced ASEAN, and commercial ties are
developing apace.
As such, Iran's
diplomatic and commercial star is rising in
energy-starved Southeast Asia nearly as fast as it
is falling in the nuclear-suspicious US and
Europe.
Clive Parker is a Chiang
Mai-based freelance journalist.
(Copyright 2007 Asia Times Online Ltd.
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