ASEAN Beat | Diplomacy | Southeast Asia

ASEAN Leaders Call For Middle East Calm, Reopening of Strait of Hormuz

The region has also pledged to move forward with a fuel-sharing agreement to offset shortages of oil from the Persian Gulf.

Leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) take plart in the plenary session of the 48th ASEAN Summit in Cebu, Philippines, May 8, 2026.

Southeast Asian leaders have called for an immediate cessation of conflict in the Middle East and reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, as well as the ratification of a joint oil-sharing pact within the 11-nation ASEAN bloc.

In a statement issued on Friday, at the close of the 48th ASEAN Summit in Cebu, the region’s leaders “expressed serious concern over the rapidly evolving situation in the Middle East” and its impacts on “regional and global peace and stability.”

“We urged all parties involved to maintain conducive conditions for the full and effective implementation of the ceasefire, by exercising utmost restraint, ceasing all hostilities, and avoiding any acts that may aggravate the situation,” it stated.

The bloc’s statement also affirmed “the importance of maintaining maritime safety and security” and freedom of navigation, and “called for the restoration of the safe, unimpeded, and continuous transit passage of vessels and aircraft in the Strait of Hormuz.”

The closure of the Strait has led to a sudden spike in the price of oil and gas from the Middle East. This has had particularly serious impacts in Asia, which sources around 60 percent of its crude oil imports from the Gulf. Most Southeast Asian nations are now facing a significant rise in fuel and energy costs that is likely to force up the prices of food and other essential goods.

ASEAN’s leaders discussed the economic ramifications of the conflict, stressing “the need to preserve the unimpeded flow of energy and essential goods, including food, agricultural inputs, pharmaceutical products, and transport fuels.”

They also pledged to coordinate more closely to safeguard the region’s energy and food security. This included “the expeditious completion of national processes towards ratification of the ASEAN Framework Agreement on Petroleum Security (APSA) to ensure its earliest possible entry into force.” The APSA is a voluntary, commercial-based framework that would enable “coordinated emergency fuel sharing and collective responses to ​supply disruption,”........

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