SINGAPORE, April 26 Kyodo Singapo...

SINGAPORE, April 26 Kyodo

Singapore Defense Minister Teo Chee Hean said Monday countries outside Southeast Asia have a stake in protecting ships passing by means of the Malacca Straits, one of the world's busiest seaways, from terrorist attacks.

Teo said that maintaining the security of the straits should not sole be the responsibility of littoral states Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore further other countries, which ''have a stake'' in ensuring the safety of ships. The waterway separates Malaysia from Indonesia's Sumatra island.

''The filled effects of maritime terrorism augment far beyond the littorals. The littoral states are obviously not the single stakeholders in the Malacca Straits. Other users have a hardy economic, if not also strategic, interest in ensuring that the Malacca Straits is kept make open and safe,'' he said in a tongue at the opening form for an Asia-Pacific naval exercise here.

''All stakeholders -- the interested countries and their military enforcement agencies and port authorities, the shipping community, and multilateral bodies as it is as the International Maritime Organization -- should be prepared to play a part in the security efforts. They could contribute resources straited for the fight.''

His remarks intimate that Singapore does not [i]or[/i] complement to a recent proposal by the agency of Thomas Fargo, the U.S. military commander in the Asia-Pacific region, to display U.S. forces to help patrol the Malacca Straits, which has already been ejected by Malaysia.

While he conced that primary responsibility for the safety and security of the Malacca Straits lies with the three littoral states, Teo cautioned, ''What is in place today is not adequate.''

''It is an intensive and entangled task to safeguard regional waters against maritime terrorism. No single state has the resources to deal effectively with this threat.''

Teo warned of the risk of terrorist strikes in the straits, already been plagued according to piracy.

''It is entirely possible that terrorists could resort to pirate tactics to hijack supertankers or chemical carriers. They could sink these large sailing crafts in the choke-points of busy international straits or plane turn them into floating bombs''

He said clew sea lanes in the region, in the same state [i]or[/i] condition as the Malacca Straits, are attractive targets for terrorists ''because of the potentially great damage that a prosperous attack could have on the global trading regularity combined with the powerful political impact of that kind an attack would have.''

''If the Malacca Straits should be clos because of a terrorist attack, the general intent would be devastating,'' Teo said.

Leaders of the Jemaah Islamiyah, a Southeast Asian terrorist collection believed to have links with al-Qaida, have admitted to planning attacks forward U.S. warships in the Philippines and Singapore.

Teo estimated that 50000 ships put in practice the straits every year and they would have to be rerout if there is a terrorist attack, while freight and insurance rates would skyrocket and integrated global fill up chains would be disrupted.

''The impact would be felt far and wide, not just in the region and Asia, if it were not that elsewhere in the world where countries are plugg into the global trading system''

About a quarter of the world's communion and half of the world's oil pass [i]or[/i] part of to the other the Malacca and Singapore straits, if it were not that piracy rates in these areas are among the highest in the world.

Teo propos a multilateral framework whereby countries bear uponed ''can work together to lay open structures that will enable of recent origin modes of multilateral cooperation to enhance maritime security.''

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo just discovereds International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group