BANGKOK -- Vietnam's ambitions to raise its stature in Southeast Asia and the broader international community as the chair of ASEAN this year have been derailed by the coronavirus pandemic, which has disrupted interactions between people and nations.
Vietnam, which holds the regional group's annually rotating chairmanship this year, has postponed the 36th summit of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations to the end of June, which was originally scheduled to take place on April 8-9 in the central Vietnamese resort of Danang. Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has informed the leaders of ASEAN about the decision to push back the summit due to the outbreak, the Foreign Ministry said recently.
