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• Australia won’t commit in advance to joining hypothetical US-China conflict, Pat Conroy says

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‘A balanced region where no one is dominated and no one dominates’

China needs to be “more transparent” about military and nuclear buildups in the region, Conroy says, and this has been a message communicated “publicly and privately” with China.

That is our position. Sovereignty will always be prioritised and that will continue to be our position.

I’m not going to foreshadow everything that the prime minister will or won’t say but the conversation with his counterparts will cover economic security and human rights issues. We’ve been clear about that, but we are being very clear that we want a balanced region where no one is dominated and no one dominates.

In my portfolio of the Pacific, we’re seeing China seeking to secure a military base in the region and we’re working hard to be the primary security partner of choice for the region because we don’t think that’s a particularly optimal thing for Australia.

This is about Australia having good international relationships with everyone in the world. The Australian people expect us to invest strongly in our diplomatic capability as well as our military capability. China is our largest trading partner. Twenty-five per cent of our exports go to China.

We’ve worked hard to stabilise the relationship and unblock $20bn worth of trade. That’s hundreds of thousands of jobs that we’ve helped protect so Prime Minister Albanese’s trip is about promoting jobs, promoting trade but also managing differences.