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[00:00.28]United States President Barack Obama will host the leaders of the 10 ASEAN members next week in California.
[00:09.48]ASEAN is the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
[00:15.48]Its 10 member countries are Brunei, Cambodia,
[00:20.66]Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
[00:32.68]Last year, ASEAN leaders created the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC).
[00:38.96]The aim is to increase trade, investment and economic ties among the 10 nations.
[00:47.60]ASEAN leaders will meet with President Obama at the 80-hectare Sunnylands estate in California.
[00:56.76]The estate was once the home of a billionaire publisher.
[01:02.00]President Obama hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping there in 2013.
[01:09.44]President Obama personally invited all the ASEAN leaders to Sunnylands
[01:16.45]when he attended the ASEAN summit last November in Malaysia.
[01:22.04]The summit participants will address key regional security and trade issues.
[01:29.12]They are also expected to discuss climate change and human trafficking.
[01:35.76]Obama administration officials see ASEAN as a key part of America's foreign policy focus on Asia and the Pacific.
[01:47.87]The U.S. also wants to increase its economic ties with the region.
[01:53.30]But observers do not expect any major results or developments from the meeting.
[01:59.52]Simon Tay is chairman of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs.
[02:06.19]He said that because 2016 is President Obama's last year in office,
[02:13.03]he does not believe "a great deal of substance" will come from next week's meeting.
[02:19.48]Observers expect a key topic at the meeting to be China's growing assertiveness in the disputed South China Sea.
[02:29.99]The Philippines and Vietnam are among the countries involved in territorial disputes with China in the South China Sea.
[02:40.99]Leaders from both countries want the United States to give them guarantees about security.
[02:47.78]But other ASEAN member countries do not want to anger Chinese leaders.
[02:54.46]That divide among member nations could also make it difficult for major developments to result from the meeting in California.
[03:04.96]Chin Leng Lim is an international law professor at Hong Kong University.
[03:11.64]He said ASEAN member countries do not agree on several major issues.
[03:17.24]Because of this, he says, the United States is "firmly in the driving seat of this summit."
[03:24.23]In other words, the United States could have control of the meeting.
[03:29.68]A major topic among ASEAN nations is trade.
[03:34.48]Last week in New Zealand, 12 countries signed the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
[03:40.72]The TPP trade agreement includes four ASEAN members: Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam.
[03:51.12]Two other ASEAN members, Indonesia and Thailand, could also soon join the TPP.
[03:59.38]ASEAN members have been talking with six other countries about forming another free trade agreement
[04:07.13]called the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).
[04:11.00]Those six countries are Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand.
[04:21.08]Deborah Elms is executive director of the Asian Trade Center in Singapore.
[04:27.44]She says the signing of the TPP and the RCEP negotiations mean ASEAN is facing more competition.
[04:37.19]She says ASEAN should "take regional integration seriously" to remain globally important.
[04:44.06]ASEAN launched its own economic community, the AEC, at the beginning of the year.
[04:51.97]It creates a single market for goods, services, capital and labor.
[04:58.44]So far, it has not shown strong results.
[05:02.65]But its supporters say that it will reach its goal of being a single market and production base by the year 2020.
[05:11.66]The Asian Development Bank says it has "the potential to become one of the largest economies and markets in the world."
[05:19.94]ASEAN nations have a population of over 626 million people,
[05:25.76]and an economy valued at $2.4 trillion.
[05:30.80]ASEAN represents the third-largest economy in Asia, behind China and India,
[05:37.44]and the seventh-largest economy in the world.
[05:40.28]I'm Mary Gotschall.
END OF TRACK. "END OF TRACK." The two men bowed. "Whoever was that person you were talking to?" she enquired, as soon as they stood together. The took of triumph faded from her eyes, she had grown worn and weary. The roses were wilting on the walls, the lights were mostly down now. Hetty, looking in to see if anything was wanted, found herself driven away almost fiercely. I only saw Master Jervie once when he called at tea time, The year 1747 was opened by measures of restriction. The House of Lords, offended at the publication of the proceedings of the trial of Lord Lovat, summoned the parties to their bar, committed them to prison, and refused to liberate them till they had pledged themselves not to repeat the offence, and had paid very heavy fees. The consequence of this was that the transactions of the Peers were almost entirely suppressed for nearly thirty years from this time, and we draw our knowledge of them chiefly from notes taken by Horace Walpole and Lord Chancellor Hardwicke. What is still more remarkable, the reports of the House of Commons, being taken by stealth, and on the merest sufferance, are of the most meagre kind, sometimes altogether wanting, and the speeches are given uniformly under fictitious names; for to have attributed to Pitt or Pelham their[112] speeches by name would have brought down on the printers the summary vengeance of the House. Many of the members complained bitterly of this breach of the privileges of Parliament, and of "being put into print by low fellows"; but Pelham had the sense to tolerate them, saying, "Let them alone; they make better speeches for us than we can make for ourselves." Altogether, the House of Commons exhibited the most deplorable aspect that can be conceived. The Ministry had pursued Walpole's system of buying up opponents by place, or pension, or secret service money, till there was no life left in the House. Ministers passed their measures without troubling themselves to say much in their behalf; and the opposition dwindled to Sir John Hinde Cotton, now dismissed from office, and a feeble remnant of Jacobites raised but miserable resistance. In vain the Prince of Wales and the secret instigations of Bolingbroke and Doddington stimulated the spirit of discontent; both Houses had degenerated into most silent and insignificant arenas of very commonplace business. "It certainly will be. Miss Widgeon," answered Maria, with strictly "company manners." "One who has never had a brother exposed to the constant dangers of army life can hardly understand how glad we all feel to have Si snatched from the very jaws of death and brung back to us." "Just plug at 'em as you would at a crow, and then go on your way whistlin'?" persisted Harry. "Hurroo!" echoed Hennessey; "that's the ticket." "Come forward, keeper," continued the baron, "and state how these arrows came into your hands!" "Yes." HoMEJULIA京香2018下载
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