ASEAN vows to create single market in the region

Special report: Premier Wen attends int'l meetings, visits Singapore

SINGAPORE, Nov. 20 (Xinhua) -- The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) vowed to enhance regional resilience and create a single market in the ASEAN Charter adopted here Tuesday.

As the regional group becomes 40 years old this year, it established the mini-constitution after about three year's preparation.

The Charter says in its Article 1, which defines the purposes of ASEAN, that the group aims to maintain and enhance peace, security and stability while further strengthen peace-oriented values in the region.

ASEAN leaders promised in the Charter to create a single market and production base with effective facilitation for trade and investment in which there is free flow of goods, services and investment. They also promised to gain freer flow of capital.

The Charter says ASEAN will endeavor to alleviate poverty and narrow the development gap within ASEAN through mutual assistance and cooperation.

As to nuclear problem, ASEAN will preserve Southeast Asia as a nuclear weapon-free zone and free of all other weapons of mass destruction, the Charter says.

Founded in August 1967, ASEAN went through 40 years and has helped lift up the status of southeastern Asian countries as a whole in the international arena.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.