Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov arrived Tuesday in the Philippine capital, Manila, for international talks focused on Southeast Asian nations, and bilateral talks with the host country. Russia, while not a member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) - a political and economic grouping of 10 countries in the region - takes part in the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), an informal multilateral dialogue grouping, at the ministerial level. During his four-day visit the Russian diplomat will attend the Russia-ASEAN ministerial conference for security discussions. Foreign ministers of ASEAN member states met earlier in the day with their counterparts from South Korea and China to discuss forming an economic community in East Asia. ASEAN was founded in 1967 by Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Later Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Burma (Myanmar) and Cambodia joined the organization. The current participants of the ARF are the ASEAN members plus Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, China, the European Union, India, North Korea, South Korea, Mongolia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Russia, East Timor, and the United States.