Malaysia today pushed for Asean approval to house a secretariat for the dialogue process between the 10-member Southeast Asian grouping and China, Japan and South Korea, which was rejected last July by some member countries.

"Malaysia believes there should be a secretariat to handle bigger issues beyond Asean. At the moment, the Asean secretariat (in Jakarta) is certaintly very overloaded," Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told reporters.

Earlier, Abdullah held a dialogue session with some 30 young Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) leaders on the sidelines of the three-day East Asia Economic Summit.

"I am looking at the Asean-plus-three cooperation as a special cooperation. If the secretariat is in Kuala Lumpur, it can concentrate more on certain projects that need to be undertaken. At the moment we cannot get the consensus.

Distribute responsibility

"We all supported Singapore to provide the secretariat for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), so this is just distributing our responsibility so that it can lighten the burden (of the Asean secretariat)," the deputy prime minister said.

Abdullah said Malaysia felt that for the dialogue process between Asean and the three East Asian countries to be meaningful, a secretariat should be established to carry out follow-up activities.

"To make Asean-plus-three effective there must be a secretariat to do follow-up work," he told the participants.

Abdullah said the new body should work closely with and complement the existing ASEAN secretariat.

"It should not undermine it. The Asean secretariat will in fact benefit from being spared the burden of servicing the Asean-plus-three process, whose agenda will no doubt mount in the years ahead," he said.

Opposition and support

Among the countries that were strongly against Malaysia's proposal were Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand. They fear a new secretariat would undermine the existing one in Jakarta.

China, Japan and South Korea, meanwhile, are said to have given tacit backing to the Kuala Lumpur plan.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, Asia's longest serving leader, has been fervently calling for an East Asian grouping.

For now, Asean ministers have agreed to allow an Asean-plus-three unit under the Asean secretariat in Jakarta.

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