Asian and European leaders back free trade, resist protectionism
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Vientiane - European and Asian leaders on Tuesday agreed to back free trade and resist protectionism as the best means of helping Europe out of its crisis and assuring Asia a rosy future.
"In Asia as well as in Europe, we are in the same boat, as the global economy keeps us interlinked," European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said at the end of the two-day Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) informal summit held in Vientiane.
The 16-year-old grouping, which brings together 49 Asian and European counties along with the European Commission and Secretariat of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean), accounts for 60 per cent of the world's trade.
The 9th ASEM fell at a time when Europe is still suffering from the eurozone crisis while Asian economies are still growing, albeit slower than previously due to declining demand in Europe - which accounts for about 40 per cent of Asian exports.
At the summit there was a broad acknowledgement that Europe needs to get its economic house in order, while Asia needs to keep its markets open to European goods, hopsfully through more free trade agreements.
"From this debate it emerged that in the modern world we all should row in the same direction," Rompuy said. "We need each other." The 10th ASEM is to be held in Brussels in 2014.//DPA
