Abstract

As the current ASEAN Chair, Cambodia has to deal with several pressing challenges on the regional agenda. These include the COVID-19 pandemic, heightened Sino-U.S. rivalry, as well as the Myanmar crisis. As we approach the mid-point of Cambodia’s Chairmanship, this webinar will discuss the opportunities and challenges for Cambodia to enhance ASEAN’s role in managing the pandemic and the Myanmar crisis, as well as to strengthen ASEAN amidst the changes in the regional security architecture. Expert panellists will share their views on these issues and suggest how Cambodia could navigate the vagaries of international and domestic politics to ensure stability in Southeast Asia and the broader Asia Pacific.

About the Panellist

Chheang Vannarith is a public policy analyst, government relations strategist, and educator. He was honoured Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2013. Currently he is serving as the President at the Asian Vision Institute (AVI), Founder and Chairman of Angkor Social Innovation Park (ASIP), and part-time Lecturer at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Prior to these appointments, he was a visiting fellow at ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Southeast Asia Consultant at the Nippon Foundation, Lecturer at the University of Leeds, Executive Director at the Cambodian Institute for Cooperation and Peace, and Assistant to Defence Minister of Cambodia.

Shafiah F. Muhibat joined CSIS in December 2000. She is currently the Deputy Executive Director for Research (since January 2022) — previously she was the Head of Department of International Relations (2018-2021) and Deputy Head of Department of Politics and International Relations (2016-2017).

Her research interests include issues of regional security in the Indo-Pacific, ASEAN, maritime security, Indonesia’s foreign policy, and development cooperation. In 2017, she joined the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) Singapore as a Senior Fellow at the Maritime Security Programme for one year. She was the Chief Editor of The Indonesian Quarterly, a quarterly academic journal published by CSIS, from 2013 to 2016; Doctoral Fellow at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy in Hamburg, Germany, from 2009 to 2012; and has received various scholarships and research grants, among others from the German Academic Exchange Service, USAID, JICA, and Korea Foundation. She served in the panel of jury for the 2022 and 2021 Adam Malik Award.

She earned a masters degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in 2003 and Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Hamburg in 2013.

Joel Ng is Research Fellow in the Centre for Multilateralism Studies. His research covers regionalism, norms, and integration in the Global South, focusing on ASEAN and the African Union in particular. He has previously worked in the non-profit and private sectors, working on refugee issues and investor relations respectively. He is the author of Contesting Sovereignty: Power and Practice in Africa and Southeast Asia (Cambridge University Press, 2021). Joel Ng has a DPhil from the University of Oxford, where he was an Oxford-Swire scholar, and also holds a MA (Distinction) from the University of Sussex, and a BA (Hons) from the University of East Anglia.