ASEAN & India.

This is coolbert:

Follow-up # 1 to the original blog entry from not so long ago now.

From the Chicago Tribune today:

"SE Asia plans maritime alliance"

"India also pledges economic, security cooperation amid tension with China."

"NEW DELHI - - South Asian nations and India promised Thursday to step up cooperation on maritime security, a move that comes amid tension with China in the potentially oil and gas rich South China Sea."

"Although India has no territorial claim in the region, it is hungry for energy and is exploring for oil and gas with Vietnam in an area contested by China. In the future, it is expected to ship liquefied natural gas from Russia through the Malacca Straits."

"Last year, and Indian navy ship was challenged for entering waters claimed by china off Vietnam."

"70 percent of the world's traffic in petroleum products passes through the Indian Ocean from the Middle East to East Asia."

[ASEAN consisting of those nations Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Myanmar [Burma], Thailand, Cambodia, Singapore, Indonesia and Laos.]

In particular, Malacca and environs as it was five hundred years ago once again at the center of the world with regard to trade and commerce, spice at one time the commodity most desired, NOW oil and natural gas and other raw materials of greatest importance.

At this exact moment China with the "String of Pearls" moving from east to west and Indian countering with the move from west to east the ASEAN-India maritime alliance.

Sham no varunah!

coolbert.