CIAO DATE: 11/02

The International Symposium: At the Front Lines of Conflict Prevention in Asia

Preface

1. The Japan Institute of International Affairs (JIIA) held an international symposium in July 2001 entitled "At the Front Lines of Conflict Prevention in Asia" and sponsored by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (MOFA). This is a summary record of the symposium proceedings.


2. Discussions on conflict prevention are not necessarily focused on any par-ticular region, although one may say that the concerns regarding conflicts in Africa are the object of very much reflection. In comparison to the con-flicts in Africa, where, in many cases, conflicts arise as a result of the failure of governance, many of the intrastate problems in Asia seem to arise as a result of instability linked with the process of democratization. When we talk about conflict prevention, we tend to refer to all conflict as "post-cold war regional conflict." In order for us to implement effective conflict pre-vention here in Asia, however, we have to understand the nature of con-flicts in this region. In the symposium we focused on three cases- Indonesia (Aceh), Myanmar, and Tajikistan- with the purpose of understanding the specific idiosyncrasies/ characteristics of conflict preven-tion in Asia.


3. The views presented at the symposium and in this report are personal and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of either the JIIA or the organiza-tions to which the participants belong. I do hope, nonetheless, that this report will be an important contribution to future discussions and analyses of conflict prevention.


4. Finally, I would like to express again my sincere gratitude to the United Nations Policy Division, Foreign Policy Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), the participants, and all those who assisted us in hosting the symposium.

Hisashi Owada
President
Japan Institute of International Affairs
August 2001

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