President to Open CTI Meeting

President Susilo B. Yudhoyono was scheduled to open the Corral Triangle Initiative [CTI] in Manado on May 15 and chair the meeting, further to attend the World Ocean Conference [WOC] on May 13 to May 14, 2009.
President Susilo and his Team would be in Manado on May 13 to May 14, 2009, this was disclosed by Dino Patty Djalal in a statement obtained by Business News by E-mail [11-15].
The two international meetings in Manado was a new phase in Indonesia’s Maritime Diplomacy which so far had been reputable as an archipelago state and pioneer in international oceanic and maritime law. In these two conventions Indonesia was looking forward to important breakthroughs in many issues related to people’s welfare, environment, climate change, and maritime cooperations.
President Susilo was also scheduled to hold a press conference after a range of meeting of the CTI was over.
The CTI Summit would be attended by 6 head of states, i.e. President Susilo B. Yudhoyono as host, President of the Filipina Philippines Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, President of Timor Leste Jose Ramos Horta, Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea Hon. Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare, Prime Minister of the Solomon Islands Hon. Dr. Derek Sikua and Prime Minister of Malaysia Dato Seri Mohd Najib bin Haji Tun Abdul Razak.
WOC was the initiative of the Indonesian Government aimed at fostering international collaboration in the maritime sector particularly within the contest of anticipating global climate change – hence the theme of the WOC Meeting in Manado was “Ocean Impact to Climte Change and Rule of Ocean to Climate Change”.
The conceptual background of this WOC meeting was that the sea played an important role in the climate platform of the world. But the present climate trend posed a serious threat to maritime life and the communities of the surrounding areas. Therefore, WOC was expected to come up with a shared commitment in the management of marine resources, which was today being discussed and formulated into “Manado Ocean Declaration” which was to be followed up with an action plan and its sound implementation.
President Susilo B Yudhoyono had from the very beginning pioneered this CTI process when the president urged the insertion of a special paragraph in the APEC Declaration in Sydney [September 2007]. This CTI initiative was based on the fact that the coral zones in the CTI region [Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Timor Leste, PNG, Solomon Islands] treasured a tremendous wealth of bio-maritime resources which was often called “Amazon of the Seas” and therefore must be protected, especially to consider that this regions concerned the life of 120 millions of people in the related regions including Indonesia.
Since the APEC Declaration, the constructive process of CTI initiative was well underway, which reached its peak at the first CTI Summit in Manado this week.
The initiative of President Susilo was supported by 5 nations, namely: the Philippines, Malaysia, Timor Leste, Papua New Guinea, and Solomon Islands, who unanimously agreed to step up sustained efforts of protection of the bio-maritime diversity within the Coral Triangle [CT] Zone which encompassed the exclusive economic zones of six states including Indonesia. At the CTI convention in Manado on May 15, 2009, a commitment was expected in the form of Leaders’ Declaration which included among others adoption of the CTI Regional Plan of Action [RPoA] which would scheme up a Seascape Program, ecosystem-based fishery management, marine area protection, climate change adaptation, and minimizing the species of sea-biotics that were threatened by extinction, from the list of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature [IUCN].