Australia is seeking to restart trade talks with Indonesia, Australian Minister for Trade and Investment Andrew Robb said, after a series of diplomatic spats left the negotiations in limbo.
“I would certainly like to get things back on track by the end of year,” Robb said in a telephone interview on Monday from New Delhi.
A 200-person business delegation that was shelved amid a dispute over Indonesia’s use of the death penalty for drug crimes is now planned for November, he said.
Australia’s bid to sign a comprehensive economic partnership agreement with Indonesia, a potential stepping stone to a free trade pact, has floundered for two years due to periodic tensions, including the disagreement over the execution of Australian citizens, a spying scandal and tension over Australia sending boatloads of asylum seekers — many of them from poor or war-torn nations — back to Indonesian waters.
Robb’s comments reflect Australia’s efforts to shield its economic relationship with its northern neighbor from ups and downs in political ties, and expand trade from the A$11.8 billion (US$9.2 billion) reached last year. Indonesia is Australia’s 11th-largest trading partner, with the Asian nation buying wheat and live animals while Australia purchases crude petroleum.
“There is a geopolitical context where we have had a few things happening, but I think underneath that there is a sensible recognition on both sides that we are linked in lots of ways,” Robb said. “It is critical that we maintain the commercial relationships and then critical that we accelerate them quite significantly.”
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott sought to brush off Indonesian concerns this month that Australia paid people smugglers to turn around boats carrying asylum seekers. Canberra recently returned its ambassador to Jakarta, having recalled him after the executions of two Australian citizens for drug crimes in April.
Robb is in New Delhi for free-trade talks with India after completing deals with China, Japan and South Korea in the past year. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi told Australian parliament in November last year that he wants to speed up negotiations on a comprehensive economic partnership agreement as he seeks better access for India’s businesses to the nation’s markets.
An India trade deal is on track to be completed by the end of the year, Robb said. Australia’s first shipments of uranium to the nation, agreed to in September last year, are close, he said, without elaborating.
India, which has an appetite for Australia’s coal, gold and copper, is the nation’s 10th-largest trading partner, accounting for about A$12 billion in exports and imports of merchandise, according to Australian government figures.
Robb also said he could not decide whether the US would see the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership through to fruition. While the US House of Representatives on Friday last week passed US President Barack Obama’s fast-track trade bill that would enable passage of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the laws still need US Senate approval.
Australia could have a “positive” outcome from negotiations to join the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, part of China’s efforts to boost its influence in the region, Robb said.
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