UN General Assembly
1968

149. Last year we referred in our general statement to the formation of the Association of South East Asian Nations, comprising Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore. Our membership in the Association is based, firstly, upon our desire to forge closer friendship and co-operation with our neighbours, to whom we are linked by long historical and cultural ties. It is also based upon our belief that the scale of modern technology has made economic autarchy an anachronism and economic inter-dependence an imperative. Several co-operative projects are under study and one or two bilateral projects have actually been started. 150. This Assembly has debated the question of China for almost twenty years. Nothing that has been said has deflected us from the view that the United Nations cannot continue to ignore the inherent right of 750 million people to be represented in this world community.