East Asian nations must pull together to boost their global stature but Australia and New Zealand should be excluded due to their Western ideology, former Malaysian leader Dr Mahathir Mohamad said.

Ten Southeast Asian countries plus China, South Korea and Japan held an inaugural East Asia Summit in December in Kuala Lumpur to push integration. Australia, India and New Zealand also attended.

"We would like to have the Southeast Asian countries... come together so that we would be able to voice our opinions in international negotiations, particularly with regard to trade and financial regimes," Mahathir told a forum in Tokyo on the future of Asia hosted by the Nihon Keizai economic daily.

"That would enable us to balance the force of the European Union and Nafta (the North American Free Trade Agreement)".

But Mahathir, who stepped down as Malaysia's prime minister two years ago after two decades in power, renewed his criticism of the invitation to Australia and New Zealand to December's East Asia summit.

"I don't think that they fit in at all because their attitude and their way of thinking represents really the thinking of the Europeans and the Americans. They would not be able to understand the needs of Asian countries," he said.

"After the European empire was dismantled there is still that desire to dominate the world and they try to dominate the world through trade and of course they want always to... use (their) military power to threaten others."

'Asians want to trade'

But Mahathir, a frequent critic of the West, said India should be considered for membership because it had made efforts to open its economy in recent years.

Mahathir, who is credited for bringing about Malaysia's rapid economic development, cited Portugal's conquest of Malacca on the southern Malay Peninsula in 1511 as a reason to be wary of European nations.

"Unless you understand the distinction you will not be able to manage your relations with the Europeans," he said.

"Asians want to trade. We don't want to conquer countries," he added.

"Of course, at one time Japan also conquered Southeast Asia including Malaysia but at that time Japan was carried away by European ideologies," he told the mostly Japanese audience.

Incumbent Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told the same forum a day earlier that Japan and its neighbors must repair strained relations or risk jeopardizing the nascent East Asian Community.