At ASEAN's seventh summit conference in Brunei last month, the proposal for an ASEAN-China Free Trade Zone was approved by ten ASEAN members. The proposal will be implemented within a period of ten years. The Prime Minister of the People's Republic of China (PRC) Zhu Rongji brought the issue up last year, but there was no agreement at that time.

Today, the international situation has changed. The United States was attacked by