Thailand To Join Malacca Strait Security System

[george]

Thailand to join Malacca Strait security system

BANGKOK: -- Thailand has agreed to join a regional cooperative scheme with Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore for the maintenance of security in the Malacca Strait soon after its new government is formed.

Speaking to the press in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta on Friday after attending a ceremony marking the signing of an agreement on the formation of a joint coordinating committee on the Malacca Strait Patrols (MSP) and Standard Operational Procedures on Coordinated Patrols, Director of Strategy and Policy of the Royal Thai Armed Forces Col. Surasit Thanadthang said Thailand could not immediately join the coordinated patrols scheme due to a political transition.

He noted, however, that the process to join the scheme on the 500-mile strait was continuing, but due to a limited budget, complicated bureaucracy and uncertain political situation following a recent decision by caretaker Prime Minister Thaksin Sinawatra to take a political pause, the process had been temporarily suspended.

"Thailand's participation in the coordinated patrols in the Malacca Strait must be approved by the cabinet, while a new cabinet will only be set up in June. Maybe two or three months after that we can join," he was quoted by a news report of ANTARA News Agency as saying.

He also said Thailand has an interest in the cooperation with its position at the northern tip of the busy shipping lane.

"Thailand will stick to its plan to join the coordinated patrol scheme on the Malacca Strait, along with three littoral states," the news report of the Indonesian national news agency, disseminated to TNA on Friday, again quoted him as saying.

The initiative to involve Thailand in the joint patrol of the strait was taken by an Indonesian delegation during a meeting in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur in August last year, in which the commanders of the armed forces of the three littoral states and Thailand took part.

Previously, Thailand had planned to join a cooperation scheme called MIST (Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand) in December 2005.

But due to the unfavourable political development, the Thai government decided to become an observer in the cooperation.

To maintain security in the Malacca Strait, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore established the trilateral cooperation of Malsindo Coordinated Patrols.

Among the cooperation was the establishment of point of controls in Belawan and Batam in Indonesia, Lumut in Malaysia and Changi in Singapore.

If Thailand joins the cooperation, another point of controls will be established in the country's southern resort province of Phuket.

--TNA 2006-04-22