Jakarta, Aug 11 (IANS): Vietnam's Deputy Foreign Minister Le Luong Minh, an alumnus of India's Jawaharlal Nehru University, may become the ASEAN's next secretary-general, according to reports here.
Vietnamese foreign ministry spokesperson Luong Thanh Nghi said that ASEAN foreign ministers have expressed support to the nomination of Minh as ASEAN secretary-general for the 2013-17 tenure.
"The post of ASEAN secretary-general is being rotated alphabetically every five years among its 10-member countries. It is now Vietnam's turn to take the secretary-general post from Thailand," Vietnam's Permanent Representative to ASEAN, Ambassador Vu Dang Dung, told The Jakarta Post.
No other candidates are said to be in the running.
An alumnus of Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, Minh joined the foreign service in 1975. He served as Vietnam's deputy foreign minister since December 2008 and if he is selected, Minh will assume his new post Jan 1, 2013.
The 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
ASEAN is currently headquartered in Indonesia, a country where India's Ambassador, Gurjit Singh, too is an alumnus of JNU.