Manila, Aug 06: Southeast Asian leaders will hold their annual meeting in Indonesia as scheduled in October despite the deadly terrorist bombing in Jakarta, Asean Secretary General Ong Keng Yong said today. "We are going to be there to reaffirm our confidence in the Indonesian authorities and the Indonesian people," Ong told the reporters on the sidelines of an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) finance ministers meeting in Manila.

The Asean leaders had decided last year to hold their 2003 meeting in Bali on October 7-8 in a move to show regional defiance against the terrorist attack on Indonesia's holiday island last October.
"We are all committed to this Asean summit in Bali and we'll go. We just have to be careful. From now onwards, we have to be careful with every meeting," Ong said. He said that the Asean summit was aimed at displaying the grouping's confidence in Indonesian authorities and "therefore we all would be there".
Ong said there were some groups which had questioned whether the Asean finance ministers meeting should have been held in Manila amid rumours of another coup attempt.
"But I think the fact that all countries are represented in the meeting here shows our strong reaffirmation of support for (Philippine) President Gloria Arroyo," he said.
Bureau Report