The Thai government in 2013 faced numerous challenges: a gradual decline in popularity, continuing insurgency in the South, problems with the economy and economic strategy, and difficult relations with the military. These challenging issues on the agenda led to widespread demonstrations and intractable conflict by the end of the year.

In 2012, Thailand continued to take steps toward the creation of a new normal. That new normal encompassed, not always successfully, reconciliations between Red and Yellow adherents, the government and the military, the government and the courts, factions in the Pheu Thai Party, and between the government and Southern insurgents. By year’s end, some normalcy had been achieved, although the future of Thaksin, reconciliation between the colors, and the violence in the South remained unresolved.

The aid dependence of Cambodian NGOs has resulted in a predominantly donor-driven peace-building process. Notwithstanding some crucial reconciliation initiatives that predate donor involvement and are rooted in local—often Buddhist—traditions, recent key initiatives in the area of transitional justice would not have happened without significant international funding and support.

Local elections consolidated the Mahinda Rajapaksa administration's grip on power. State-led efforts to stimulate economic growth continued with major infrastructure projects in the northeastern and southern parts of Sri Lanka. No significant progress was made toward a political settlement and reconciliation with the Tamil community, and the government came under increasing international pressure about its conduct in the last months of the civil war after the release of the United Nations Advisory Panel report.

The two key events of 2010 in Sri Lanka were the respective presidential and parliamentary elections, which enabled President Mahinda Rajapaksha's government to consolidate power in both the executive and legislative branches of the state in the post-civil war era. Regime priority has been toward political consolidation, rather than ethnic reconciliation and a political solution to potential ethnic tensions in the country.

In the first half of 2010, political tensions in Thailand rose steadily until they literally burst into flames as anti-government protesters set a commercial district on fire in response to the government's crackdown to reclaim the area. The country's other internal conflict, communal violence in the Muslim-majority provinces of the South, was all but ignored in the broader political emergency.

Political developments in Sri Lanka in 2009 centered primarily around the end of the protracted civil war between the state and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), with the total military defeat of the LTTE. Sri Lanka subsequently entered an uncertain phase of post-civil war political reconstruction. The announcement to hold early presidential elections in January 2010 added to uncertainties to Sri Lanka's post-civil war political process. Sri Lanka also moved away from the West toward other Asian and Middle Eastern powers.

Timor-Leste (East Timor) appears to have put the crisis of 2006 behind it. No major outbreaks of violence recurred. The security dividend translated into tangible economic progress. Added to that, the otherwise impoverished, half-island Southeast Asian nation has joined the holders of sovereign funds. Still, macro-development indicators do not give cause for unbridled optimism.

This article analyzes factors compelling ASEAN to relax its non-interference policy regarding members and intervene in Burma's internal affairs. The paper argues that the factors include pressure from individual members, ASEAN as a group, and the international community. The situation in Burma has led ASEAN to review this policy.