The US Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, underscored US commitment to Asia yesterday with a flurry of meetings with regional counterparts after months of US preoccupation with Europe.
"The United States has been paying a lot of attention to the Balkans and Europe lately but we have not lost sight of the rest of the world," she said in Singapore.
"No region of the world is of greater importance to US interests or to the future of world stability and peace than the Asia-Pacific," she said.
Yesterday she had seven bilateral meetings - including talks with the Indian and Chinese foreign ministers - on the eve of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Regional Forum on security.
Ms Albright said she hoped for progress on subjects ranging from China-Taiwan relations and Spratly islands tensions to concern over stability in South Asia and the Korean peninsula, fears of Indonesian unrest, and human rights in Burma.
Most of those topics were covered in part in her meetings yesterday with the Chinese Foreign Minister, Mr Tang Jiaxuan, and the Indian Foreign Minister, Mr Jaswant Singh, during which she urged restraint on Taiwan and Kashmir and stressed the importance Washington places on nuclear non-proliferation.
Mr Tang said he warned the US against stoking the flames of independence in Taiwan and also discussed efforts to mend ties with Washington after the May bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in US-led NATO air raids.
Mr Singh reaffirmed his country's commitment to ratifying a nuclear test ban treaty and thanked the US for its role in easing tensions in Kashmir, US officials said.
"I want to make clear that Rangoon [the old name of Burma's capital, Yangon] should talk to the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi," Ms Albright said, referring to the dissident leader and her National League for Democracy.
Today, Ms Albright is expected to take up the issue of Indonesia in earnest, meeting the Indonesian Foreign Minister, Mr Ali Alatas.
She is to tell him that Washington expects Jakarta to make good on its promises for a peaceful transition to a new government as well as a free and fair vote in East Timor next month on an offer of autonomy.