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"Thai-led 6-Country Single Visa Plan" May Have Legs?
Transcript of the above video:
As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing, I have discussed this before, this notion of a 6-country Schengen-like or sort of shared tourist area here in ASEAN, here in Southeast Asia. ASEAN is an acronym for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations; it's kind of a regional body if you will. It's not exactly a governing body, it's basically, I've heard it discussed as it is kind of like a dialogue forum for the countries here in Southeast Asia that are members, and it has operated effectively in that capacity for quite some time now actually.
That said I have been to this point a bit cynical, maybe a little bit negative about the prospects for sort of one of these pan-ASEAN type Visa schemes or at least a multi-country type visa scheme. I like to think that I'm the first person that will stand in line to stand up and say that he will stand corrected. It looks to me like my initial assessment might have been a little too pessimistic. That said, what am I talking about?
I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, that is bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Cambodia backs Thai-led 6-country single visa plan - say that three times fast, that is an interesting little headline there. That said, quoting directly: "Cambodia has agreed with the Thai Government's initiative to facilitate cross-border travel for tourists from six countries in the region through a single Visa policy called "6 Countries, 1 Destination", positioning Thailand as a regional tourism hub, according to a source at Government House. The move came after talks between Cambodian Minister of Tourism Huot Hak and Dusit Manapan and Chayika Wongnapachant, advisors to the Thai Foreign Minister Maris Sangiampongsa, to discuss cross-border travel and promoting seamless tourism on Monday in Phnom Penh." Quoting further: "The source said the Cambodian Tourism Minister supported Thailand's "6 Countries, 1 Destination" policy and agreed to discuss the issue further with Cambodia's Ministry of Interior, Customs Department and other relevant agencies."
Yeah, I have said in the past, these Foreign Ministries talk but that's not who's going to be responsible when the rubber hits the road for administration of Immigration Law and Policy domestically within a lot of these countries. So, sort of knitting all of this together is not only going to require certain levels of collaboration at the level of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but it's also probably going to require some collaboration inter Interior Ministry level if you will. It would be sort of analogous to interacting with the Department of Homeland Security in the United States; that would be somewhat similar to interacting with the Ministry of Interior here, especially as it pertains to Immigration in either Cambodia or Thailand. That said, quoting further: "The source said the feedback from these agencies will be proposed to Cambodia's Cabinet for consideration ahead of an official visit by Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra."
So interesting. I have got to be honest with you. When this was sort of first broached, I kind of threw this in the “aah dismiss it!” What immediately came to my mind was I spent like two years talking about so-called “Travel Bubbles” in the middle of COVID; it became almost a joke amongst me and the producer that helped me do these videos that it seemed like once a week we were doing those videos and then it came to nothing. I have heard the notion of an ASEAN or a pan-ASEAN visa going all the way back to when I was heavily blogging, so that is more than 10 years ago this has been discussed to varying levels of interest. Here now it looks like there is getting to be some momentum behind this, even in an international context, and if Cambodia is hooked in with the Thais on this, I can kind of see where the two of them together can sort of form the kernel from whence a greater sort of again 6-countries sort of 1 Visa type of scenario. I can start to see a scenario arising in the foreseeable or more unforeseeable futures where yeah you could actually see that sort of starting to shape up if you've now got Ministry of Interior in Cambodia and Ministry of Interior in Thailand now talking. I mean presumably there was probably further discussion as the recent ASEAN summit was in Laos. We have seen discussions that the Vietnamese are rather keen to think about this as well as Malaysia seems rather keen, so maybe there is some sort of momentum behind this, more so than I initially thought that there was. Maybe this thing has legs after all. It will be interesting to see, and we will certainly keep you updated on this channel as this situation evolves.