The 10-member ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. They are joined by Japan, China and South Korea in the ASEAN Plus Three talks. This is the 13 member Asian cover.

The East Asia Summit involves these 13 plus Australia, New Zealand and India.

Then comes the ARF - Asean Regional Forum -  that includes these 16 and Canada, North Korea, Russia, the U.S., the EU and others - so here we get the whole Eurasian world with the addition of the US and Canada, and with the exclusion of Africa, Latin America and the Small Island States.

The ASEAN Regional Forum will meet in Singapore on this Thursday - on Thursday - July 24, 2008.

The series of meetings hosted by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, is held annually in the summer to prepare for the leaders’ Summit later in the year that will focus mainly on food and security, disaster management, economic conditions and climate change issues, Japanese Foreign Ministry officials said in Tokyo.

The ARF now will place specific emphasis on security issues, particularly disaster relief, counterterrorism, maritime security, and nonproliferation and disarmament, according to the officials.

The whole onion reminds us of what went on under the cover of the runnup to the Hokkaido G8 meetings earlier this month. This time, the Summit will include only the 13 States that amount to the 11 Asian States including India and the auxiliaries from Australia - New Zealand. This Summit will leave out the TransAtlantic party goers.