The ASEAN Community will consolidate ASEAN’s stature and pioneer role in regional and international arena, Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said.

Myanmar President U Thein Sein has called on the country's political forces to work together in unity to overcome the challenges facing the country.

The ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) – a key pillar in the ASEAN Community which came into being on December 31, 2015 – has set a foundation for the start of a new chapter in economic integration in the Southeast Asian region.

(VOV) - India has strengthened its security following a terror attack at the Panthankot Air Base in northern India and a series of terror threats at public places over the past few days. 

The White House unveiled gun control measures on January 4 that require more gun sellers to get licenses and more gun buyers to undergo background checks, moves President Barack Obama said were well within his authority to implement without congressional approval.

Saudi Arabia widened its rift with Iran on January 4, saying it would end air traffic and trade links with the Islamic republic and demanding that Tehran must "act like a normal country" before it would restore severed diplomatic relations.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for a truck bomb attack on a compound for civilian contractors near Kabul airport on January 4, hours after a suicide bomber blew himself up in the latest in a series of attacks in the Afghan capital over the past week.

Japan and the US have expressed their concern over China’s testing landing of a plane on an airstrip illegally built on Chu Thap (Fiery Cross) Reef in Vietnam’s Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelago.

At least one person was killed and a dozen injured when an earthquake measuring 6.8 struck near Imphal in eastern India on January 4, sending people running from their homes and knocking out power to the city near the Myanmar border.

Saudi Arabia cut ties with Iran on January 3, responding to the storming of its embassy in Tehran in an escalating row between the rival Middle East powers over Riyadh's execution of a Shi'ite Muslim cleric.

Attacks by five suicide bombers on an Iraqi military base north of Baghdad on January 3 killed at least 15 members of the security forces and wounded 22 others, security sources said.

Gunfire and blasts were heard on January 3 at an Indian Air Force base attacked by militants a day earlier, as security forces hunted two gunmen still at large in the sprawling facility near the border with Pakistan.

Cambodia dispatched its sixth batch of 184 peacekeepers to Lebanon on January 2 to replace the fifth group, who completed their one-year United Nations peacekeeping mission.

President Barack Obama, frustrated by Congress' inaction on gun control, will meet with U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch on January 4 to discuss ways of reducing gun violence unilaterally through measures that do not require congressional approval.

A new appraisal names the United States as one of the threats to Russia's national security for the first time, a sign of how relations with the west have deteriorated in recent years.

A series of Iranian officials vowed on January 1, 2016 to expand Tehran's missile capabilities, a challenge to the United States which has threatened to impose new sanctions even as the vast bulk of its measures against Iran are due to be lifted under a nuclear deal.

A suicide attack on a French restaurant in the Afghan capital Kabul on January 1, 2016 killed a 12-year-old boy and wounded more than a dozen other people, officials said.

ASEAN has launched its Community but has already put in place the path to ensure that the momentum of the integration process continues over the next 10 years.

(VOV) - The ASEAN Community was officially established on December 31, an important milestone in the Association’s 50-year history. The formation of the ASEAN Community will greatly benefit the region and each member. Vietnam has prepared for the new period which will surely present many opportunities and challenges.

Europe ushered in the New Year with heightened security fears on December 31 as German police evacuated two train stations in Munich, citing a tip about a planned militant attack, and Belgium arrested three people over an alleged plot.

A UN plan to suspend Syria's nearly five-year-old civil war calls for listing which militant groups may be fought despite an eventual ceasefire, one of the toughest issues vexing diplomats trying to end the conflict.

The White House has delayed imposing new financial sanctions on Iran over its ballistic-missile program, The Wall Street Journal reported on December 31.

President Hassan Rouhani ordered his defense minister on December 31 to expand Iran's missile program, in defiance of a US threat to impose sanctions over a ballistic missile test Iran carried out in October.

China welcomes the official formation of the ASEAN Community and considers it an important milestone in the bloc’s integration, according to Xinhua news agency.

Its summits and ministerial meetings get a lot of media coverage, but ASEAN’s engagement with its stakeholders, partners and constituencies goes far beyond official venues.

The establishment of the ASEAN Community on December 31, 2015, with three key pillars of Politics-Security, Economics, Culture-Society, marks a major milestone of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

ASEAN ushers in 2016 as a Community, bringing to fruition an integration process that creates new opportunities for its 622 million people to make use of the ASEAN Community’s outward-looking character, economic robustness and shared regional identity for Southeast Asia’s overall development.

Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman announced the official formation of the ASEAN Community on December 31.

US-led forces have killed 10 Islamic State leaders in air strikes, including individuals linked to the Paris attacks, a US spokesman said, dealing a double blow to the militant group after Iraqi forces ousted it from the city of Ramadi.

President Barack Obama's administration is preparing new sanctions on international companies and individuals over Iran's ballistic missile program, sources familiar with the situation said on December 30.