BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN : The Asean Defence Senior Officials’ Meeting (ADSOM) and Asean Defence Senior Officials’ Meeting-Plus (ADSOM-Plus) meetings were held back-to-back on May 17 and 18 at the Ministry of National Defence in Cambodia.

Both meetings were chaired by Special Advisor to the Deputy Prime Minister General Nem Sowath, and Minister of National Defence of Cambodia as well as Director-General of the General Department of Policy and Foreign Affairs, Ministry of National Defence of Cambodia in his capacity as the ADSOM and ADSOM-Plus Leader of Cambodia.

Representing the Ministry of Defence of Brunei Darussalam was Deputy Permanent Secretary (Policy and Strategy) at the Ministry of Defence Adi Ihram Mahmud in his capacity as the representative of the ADSOM and ADSOM-Plus Leader of Brunei Darussalam.

The ADSOM, among others, discussed reports of the 19th Asean Chiefs of Defence Forces’ Meeting and 16th Network of the Asean Defence and Security Institutions Annual Meeting; progress and assessment of Asean defence cooperation including initiatives from Brunei Darussalam namely the Asean Direct Communications Infrastructure (ADI), Asean Defence Interaction Programme (ADIP) and Logistics Support Framework (LSF); consideration of new concept papers and discussion papers; and ongoing initiatives in which Brunei Darussalam provided an update on its A Future-Ready ADMM: A Strategy Paper.

The ADSOM-Plus, among others, discussed the report on recent developments in Asean presented by the Asean Secretariat and progress report of the seven areas of practical cooperation under the ADMM-Plus in which Brunei Darussalam and Australia are the co-chairs of the ADMM-Plus Experts’ Working Group on Military Medicine for the 2021-2024 cycle.

The ADSOM-Plus leaders also exchanged views on regional and international defence and security issues.

On the sidelines of the meetings, bilateral meetings were also held between Brunei Darussalam with Cambodia, Singapore and Korea.

The ADSOM-Plus Leaders also made a joint courtesy call to Cambodia Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Defence General Samdech Pichey Sena Tea Banh and attended an ADSOM-Plus Gala Dinner event.

The ADSOM and ADSOM-Plus meetings serve as significant platforms where senior officials endorse the preparation for the 15th Asean Defence Ministers Meeting (ADMM) in June and 9th ADMM-Plus in November 2022.

  - ANN