Indonesia President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said the ASEAN Charter was a document that would enable South East Asia to face various global challenges in the future with greater unity, ANTARA reported. "With the ASEAN Charter, we are more bound than ever before to bridge differences among ourselves in more friendly ways," President Yudhoyono said in his address at a ceremony marking the promulgation of the ASEAN Charter at the ASEAN Secretariat here on Monday. He hoped that in the future, differences among ASEAN member countries should be regarded as an asset, and not as a potential for conflicts, for the sake of ASEAN unity. The ASEAN Charter, he said, would also strengthen regional integration and make ASEAN a law-based organization as well as a community-based organization in the political, economic and social fields. With the charter, ASEAN member countries would share a commitment and spirit to move toward the formation of an ASEAN Community in 2015, he said. Yudhoyono also said with the ASEAN Charter, ASEAN member countries would be more ready to deal with international problems and challenges, such as climate change, the energy crisis, the approaching deadlines of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and competition in the globalization era. According to the president it was thanks to the existence of ASEAN, that the Southeast Asian region had enjoyed peace and stability over the past four decades.
