Beyond public health, the COVID-19 pandemic has also had wide-ranging political impacts for US-China relations. Despite hope for global cooperation amid a global pandemic and economic crisis, antagonism between the world’s two largest powers is on the rise. We held an online seminar on 6...
Vietnam was the first country in ASEAN to begin easing its COVID-19 restrictions on 23 April, and has continued to update its measures. Thailand has also begun to ease its measures, though the daily curfew put in place during its state of emergency was retained....
Some countries in ASEAN have begun to ease the movement restrictions they implemented in previous weeks to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Singapore, for example, is slowly adjusting measures under its Circuit Breaker to lead up to the resumption of social and economic activities, while the...
Over the past week, confirmed cases of COVID-19 continued to rise across ASEAN. However, certain countries have announced that they would be allowing the resumption of certain social and economic activities, confident that their movement restrictions have sufficiently slowed the spread of the virus. Here’s...
Kick-starting the world’s economy after COVID-19 would not be easy, especially when tensions between the US and China still run high. For the economy to recover, Associate Professor Simon Tay, Chairman of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs is of the view that global cooperation with both...
In ASEAN, varying rates of new infections have led countries to take different policy directions. Vietnam, having crested this wave of the outbreak, relaxed its social distancing policies on Thursday, 23 April 2020. Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia, however, expanded existing measures meant to contain the...
In the three months since the first COVID-19 cases were reported in ASEAN, governments have implemented many policies to “flatten the curve” of new infections. These efforts have been of varying effectiveness, and some countries have emerged as success stories. Yet, governments should remain vigilant...
Indonesian President Joko Widodo announced on 21 April that Indonesians would be banned from going on the Idul Fitri mudik, or exodus, that is scheduled to take place over the coming weeks. Previously, the President had banned civil servants from going on these journeys on...
As Singapore’s “Circuit Breaker” rounded off its second week of implementation, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong announced on 21 April 2020 that the overall period would be extended until 1 June 2020. Tighter restrictions would be put in place until 4 May 2020, the date...
On Monday, 20 April 2020, Associate Professor Simon Tay, Chairman of the SIIA, spoke with PBS Thailand, on a range of COVID-19 related topics. In the interview, Associate Professor Tay reinforced the need for ASEAN for work together to combat COVID-19 successfully. Watch it here...