Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri reiterated in Jakarta Friday that the Association of Southeast Asian Nations must remain open to the global economy.

"An economic integration should not be understood as merely building a common internal strength, while shutting the world out.On the contrary, ASEAN must remain open to the global economy," the president made the remarks at the opening ceremony of the 36th ASEAN Economic Ministerial Meeting.

"ASEAN must continue to improve its trade and economic ties with its main partners, such as India, China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Australia and New Zealand," she said.

Megawati asserted that she supports free trade agreements concluded with important world economic players, because "their main objective is to widen the market for goods produced in ASEAN and to enable us to gain access to cheaper sources of capital goods and products."

In October last year, leaders of the regional grouping agreed to alter ASEAN by 2020 from an association of countries into a community of its ten members, namely Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Megawati, who chaired the last year's summit, said "we are all convinced that the ASEAN economic integration is crucial for the entire ASEAN community."

"Let us seek together the ways to encourage regional trade and accelerate economic integration. Let us show the world our real strength, by becoming the Economic Community that we aspire for," she said.

Source: Xinhua