Australian foreign minister Penny Wong has said she is working with US secretary of state Marco Rubio to reschedule a meeting between Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and US president Donald Trump.
The pair were scheduled to meet at the G7 leaders’ summit in Canada last week, but Trump left early as the conflict between Israel and Iran heightened.
Wong met Rubio at the White House to discuss the matter, telling ABC TV that Rubio “expressed regret, as he did to me when we spoke on the phone, for the rescheduling of the meeting that had to occur that was between the prime minister and the president as a consequence of the president leaving the G7 early”.
“I explained to him we understood that the president had to leave early. We understood why the meeting needed to be rescheduled”.
“We’re working on rescheduling a meeting between the president and the prime minister.”
Albanese has yet to meet with Trump nine months into his election win, and has faced criticism from the Coalition for not pushing to meet with the US president earlier.
When asked whether or not Rubio had requested more money to go towards Australia’s defence spending, Wong said he hadn’t mentioned the issue.
As global tensions rise, Nato states have pledged to increase defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP by 2035, but Australia has sidestepped these calls.
“I know there’s been a lot written about this, but I would say to this to you- we did talk a lot about what we do together,” Wong said. “Secretary Rubio didn’t raise Australia’s defence budget with me.”
“What we talked about was our partnership and the ways in which we work together,” she said, noting that this included “the AUKUS agreement and the benefits that it gives all three countries”.
“It’s a good deal for Australia, it’s a good deal for the United States, and it’s a good deal for the United Kingdom.”
Alongside Wong’s visit, Rubio met with representatives from members of the Indo-Pacific Quad.
Wong described the Quad meeting as “a very positive discussion”, and “a real sign of how important the partnership is and the importance that the United States places on this Quad grouping”.
Other topics discussed included strengthening cooperation on developing critical minerals supply chains, a “strategic vulnerability” that Wong said Australia could do more to develop.