A month after the tsunami disaster, newspapers continue in their usual commentary about the tragedy through various interpretations.

As if it was some kind of benediction, salvation or otherwise what's been unanimously agreed is the global dimension of the disaster considering the many affected nations and the corresponding number of casualties belonging to those nations.

Apart from it, we also saw the opportunistic instincts of donor nations whose promise of relief aid was preconditioned, either with the cessation of rebellion in Aceh or an eye for political mileage.

For South East Asia, the impact of the disaster was also indeed an 'opportunity'. As how Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono put it, it is a chance to build on the 'culture of solidarity', which over the years has been notoriously absent.

How much of inkling there was to that 'culture' can only be seen in the pre-1997 days. Then the region 'abetted' by the depreciation of the Thai baht triggered a series of financial meltdowns throughout South East Asia, capped memorably by former Malaysian premier Dr Mahathir Mohamad' vitriol that pointed to a Jewish conspiracy theory.

When that was not enough, a series of spats involving Malaysia and Singapore put relations deeper into a freeze, highlighted by some unpleasant moments when Singapore athletes were jeered at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur.

The tenuous state of relations plunged further after the Sept 11 terrorist attacks in 2001. And when the United States took retaliatory military action against Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and 2003, the drift among Muslims and non-Muslims states in the grouping widened even further apart.

Worse still, were the national positions of these states in whose expression and ideologies, were planted the seeds for mutual suspicion.

Unity through tragedy

Now like squabbling siblings coming together to mourn the passing of a next-of-kin, Asean states are again talking with than barking at one another.

And what has resulted from their co-operation is the discernible appearance of a joint stake to help one another, fostered none other than by the closeness of geography. By such an undertaking we are also seeing the forging of a common destiny.

Even so, the large number of South East Asian casualties could have also formed the consensus to collectively ratchet up the need to help in all forms.

As illuminating as is the exemplary role of Singapore in mobilising relief aid, the tragedy was more or less one of the 'finest hours' of some of the untested political virgins in the region.

With both Indonesia and Singapore only having just seen the transfer of power, the tragedy became a rallying ground for these leaders to forge consensus and create a bye-way to foster team spirit.

By doing many of the things associated with relief, these leaders by keeping alive the spirit of Asean are also proving their political currency in the region.

They have also displayed that when crisis looms it is possible to leave petty politics aside and band together for the nobility of a humanitarian cause.

They have also shown acumen and political maturity in seeking out one another's counsel - a situation that many would contrast to the Bam earthquake in 2003 when Iran refused all aid from Israel!

Because it has to be a 'culture of solidarity', Yudhoyono is justifiably right to seek the grouping's states to secure themselves 'not only from the fury of disasters but also from the folly of human conflict'.

That last clause is particularly instructive because of the grave challenge and test it provides Asean with, for too often than not national policies have the habit of being hijacked by narrow parochial interest.

Transcending them is indeed the next real test and if the new leaders can foster a new era of regional co-operation in this post-tsunami period, will the new Asean with its new spirit soar past its current mood of pessimism.

Though no mean feat, such a vision is neither a mirage nor without grasp.

JAYA PRAKASH lectures in journalism in Calton Education Centre.