Under the ASEAN Free Trade Area, members have to adopt tariff cuts and other liberalization measures, on pain of exclusion from AFTA. However, if intervention is done not in pursuit of the grouping's goals, but at the behest of outside forces, then ASEAN appears to be an instrument of, rather than a bulwark against, big-power bullying.

CNN: The Bloc Buster

We will go through extensive consultations with our stakeholders, with Congress, as well as with the Japanese to go through the issues -- and I mentioned agriculture, services, manufacturing, including non-tariff measures, and to discuss the ambition level of the TPP and Japan's willingness to address trade liberalization in a sort of comprehensive way that would make them a good candidate for membership.

WHITEHOUSE: Press Briefing