ASEAN Plus Three countries deepen cooperation

BEIJING - East Asia's efforts to institutionalize regional financial cooperation gained momentum as the ASEAN Plus Three Macroeconomic Research Office started operations on Monday, signaling a concrete step toward the formation of a potential Asia Monetary Fund.

Based in Singapore, the Macroeconomic Research Office, or AMRO, is a new regional macroeconomic surveillance and crisis management unit, launched by the ministries of finance, central banks and monetary authorities of China, Japan, South Korea and the 10 countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Wei Benhua, a former deputy head of China's State Administration of Foreign Exchange, arrived in Singapore on Monday to take his helm as AMRO's first director.