BANGKOK – To get a view of current development and social news and issues relating to the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN), which was set up by IPS Asia-Pacific under its programme with the International Development Research Centre.

ASEAN, South-east Asia’s main grouping of 10 member countries, gets a lot of media coverage. But most of this is centred around high-profile events and summits, leaving little room for in-depth analysis and investigation especially of social issues that rarely make the headlines at such events.

But as ASEAN reaches 45 years old this year, especially against the backdrop of the ASEAN Community goals in 2015, there is a need for deeper reportage about the impact of its kind of regionalism and how it affects the daily lives of its constituency in South-east Asia.

ASEANnews.net web page features in-depth features by journalists from South-east Asian countries, including those contributing to the ‘Reporting Development in ASEAN’ series that is the foundation of this website.

The site will follow key development issues in ASEAN, beyond the summitry that many identify the regional organisation with.

The ‘Reporting Development in ASEAN’ website is part of the media programme of the same name, implemented by IPS Asia-Pacific with the support of the IDRC.

Its workshop for writers was held in late June 2012 in Singapore, hosted by IPS Asia-Pacific’s partner and host, the ASEAN Studies Centre. For a report on that workshop, read ASEAN: Useless Body, Superpower or Somewhere in Between?