Australia tells U.S. it has no intention of injuring important China ties
By David Brunnstrom and Daphne Psaledakis WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States and close ally Australia held high-level talks on China on Tuesday and agreed on the need to uphold a rules-based
July 28, 2020
By David Brunnstrom and Daphne Psaledakis
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States and close ally Australia held high-level talks on China on Tuesday and agreed on the need to uphold a rules-based global order, but the Australian foreign minister stressed that Canberra’s relationship with China was important and it had no intention of injuring it.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark Esper held two days of talks in Washington with their Australian counterparts, who had flown around the world for the meetings despite the COVID-19 pandemic and face two weeks of quarantine on their return.At a joint news conference, Pompeo praised Australia for standing up to pressure from China and said Washington and Canberra would continue to work together to reassert the rule of law in the South China Sea, where China has been pressing its claims.
Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said the United States and Australia shared a commitment to the rule of law and had reiterated their commitment to hold countries to account for breaches, such as China’s erosion of freedoms in Hong Kong.
She said the two sides had also agreed to form a working group to monitor and respond to harmful disinformation and would look at ways to expand cooperation on infectious diseases, including access to vaccines.
At the same time, she said Australia did not agree on everything with Beijing – or with the United States.
“The relationship that we have with China is important. And we have no intention of injuring it,” she said. “But nor do we intend to do things that are contrary to our interests.”
She said Australia and the United States had a shared interest in an Asia-Pacific region that was free, prosperous and secure and were broadly aligned on issues, including China.
“We don’t agree on everything though. And that’s part of a respectful relationship, is part of a relationship that has endured over 100 years of ‘mateship.'”
Payne did not elaborate on disagreements with Washington, but said Australia made its own decisions and judgments based on its national interests and security.
“We deal with China in the same way. We have a strong economic engagement, other engagement, and it works in the interests of both countries,” Payne said.
Pompeo, a persistent and forceful critic of Beijing, said in a speech last week that Washington and its allies must use “more creative and assertive ways” to press China to change its ways and called it the “mission of our time.”
Pompeo also said then it may be time for “a new grouping of like-minded nations, a new alliance of democracies” for this purpose.
(Reporting by David Brunnstrom and Daphne Psaledakis, Editing by Franklin Paul and Grant McCool)