Dr. Seyed AliMohammad Mousavi, the D-8 Secretary-General, held a meeting with Dr. Lim Hong Hin, Deputy Secretary-General of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on 25 August 2016 at the latter’s office in the ASEAN Secretariat in Jakarta. 

The two interlocutors held a fruitful and effective discussion in a cordial environment. Dr. Mousavi informed Dr. Lim of the latest developments taking place within the Organization and conveyed that 02 (two) Members of ASEAN have common membership with the D-8. He also said that the D-8 was moving towards implementation of policies in the next phase of its life cycle and undertaking common projects that would directly benefit people to improve their economic standard.

The D-8 Secretary-General also informed Dr. Lim that trade, energy, industry and SME, transportation and agriculture are the five priority areas of the D-8 cooperation among 21 identified areas of cooperation in the D-8 Organization. He mentioned that cooperation between the D-8 and the ASEAN may benefit Member States in designing their development activities more efficiently and effectively. He also said that ASEAN is a successful regional organization and the D-8 could benefit a lot from institutional cooperation with it. 

Dr. Lim warmly welcomed the D-8 Secretary-General to the ASEAN Secretariat and informed him of the ASEAN scope of work. Both concurred that the two Organizations had a lot of scope for joint effort in order to yield mutual benefit, sharing of information and capacity building. He appreciated the Secretary-General for the inputs and looked forward to working together in future.