OREANDA-NEWS. Leaders in seven out of ten countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) refused to attend a U.S. participation in Bangkok after U.S. President Donald Trump didn't attend the event and did not send another senior executive in his place.

According to the regulations, the summit should be attended by heads of state or prime ministers. According to the Bangkok Post, in the end there were only prime ministers of Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. The rest of the organization’s member countries — Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Cambodia, Myanmar, and the Philippines — were represented by foreign ministers.

Trump National Security Assistant Robert O'Brien appeared at the summit as head of the US delegation. Under the rules, Washington had to send a vice president or secretary of state. On the sidelines of the summit, according to a Singapore newspaper, O'Brien read out a letter from Trump, in which he invited ASEAN participants to come to the United States next year for a separate “special summit”. This is the second time Trump misses the ASEAN Summit. Last year, he sent US Vice President Mike Pence to a meeting.