ADSOM And ADSOM-Plus Starts Thursday

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 12 (Bernama) -- The ASEAN Defence Senior Official's Meeting (ADSOM) and ADSOM-Plus, the first time ever held in Malaysia, commenced Thursday. The Defence Ministry's media relations officer, Lt. Mohamad Affiq Abdullah said the three-day meeting was expected to discuss, among others, strategic and practical cooperation among the member states and plus countries. He said senior defence officials from all the 10 member states, as well as eight other countries for the ADSOM-Plus, namely Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, Russia and the United States were attending the meeting. Mohamad Affiq said the ADSOM-Plus platform had thus far established six Experts' Working Groups (EWGs), focusing on maritime security, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, peacekeeping operations, military medicine, counter terrorism and humanitarian mine action. "These EWGs plan and operationalise the activities approved by the ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting and are co-chaired by one member state and one Plus country for a cycle of three years," he said when met at the meeting Thursday. The ADSOM day one Thursday, was chaired by the Defence Ministry's secretary-general Abdul Rahim Mohamad Radzi. Mohamad Affiq said the activities had contributed to greater interoperability between the armed forces as well as the capacity and capability building of the member countries. The meeting themed, "ASEAN: Maintaining Regional Security and Stability for and by the People", was preceded by both Working Groups meeting held in Johor on Jan 22 to 24. -- BERNAMA