Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne yesterday said her country’s alliance with the US had never been more vital in an era of escalating challenges in the Indo-Pacific region.
In her first major policy speech since she took over the Australian Ministry for Foreign Affairs in August, Payne told an Australian Institute of International Affairs conference that Australia needed to defend its interests in “a period of strategic uncertainty.”
‘US BANDWAGON’
Photo: Petty Officer 2nd Class Diana Quinlan / US Navy / AP
The former defense minister’s staunch declaration of support for the US, a treaty defense partner since 1951, came after the Chinese state-run newspaper China Daily accused Australia and Japan in an editorial last week of “jumping on the US bandwagon to contain China.”
“We have no doubt that the US will remain an enduring presence in our region,” Payne said. “Other powers will rise, rivalries might intensify, but the US will be here.”
“The challenges in the Indo-Pacific region render our alliance as vital as it has ever been,” she added.
Australia was also committed to constructive collaboration and engagement with China, its most important trade partner, Payne said.
However, she said that the region would be safer and more prosperous if differences were managed by agreed rules rather than an exercise of power — an apparent reference to the Chinese militarization of the South China Sea, where China claims almost all the territory.
The China Daily called on Australia and Japan to work with China to address security challenges, instead of “letting the US lead them by the nose.”
MISTRUST
Mistrust on the scale of the Cold War “will create a fragile peace that risks being shattered by the slightest misstep,” the newspaper said.
Relations between the US and China have deteriorated, as escalating trade disputes and tariff hikes have been exacerbated by an announced sale of US military equipment to Taiwan and military operations.
In past years, military ties have been somewhat stable, but a series of events this year have roiled the waters.
China protested a recent mission by nuclear-capable US B-52 bombers over the South China Sea, calling the flights “provocative.”
Two weeks ago, the US Navy destroyer USS Decatur sailed close to Chinese-claimed islands in the South China Sea.
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