JOURNALIST:
What are you hoping for out of the APEC meeting this weekend Prime Minister?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well it';s really at two levels, the bilateral meetings are very important with President Yudhoyono and President Hu Jintao and the Prime Minister of Malaysia and many others. And of course it';ll be the first time that I';ve seen President Bush since important political events for both of us. There';ll be an emphasis I believe on security and terrorism issues, but the most important thing is to try and maintain and to the extent possible increase the momentum towards the original Bogor trade goals and it';s very important to keep that in mind. But it';s an excellent opportunity, a meeting such as this, to interact with the leaders of such a very large part of the world.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister, what would you like to say to President Bush now that you';re both members of the #8220;coalition of the winning#8221;?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, no hubris.
JOURNALIST:
#8230;.bilateral with Mr Bush or will it be maybe a pull aside at the Leaders Retreat?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look we talk to each other quite a bit and I';m sure we';ll have plenty of opportunities.
JOURNALIST:
How do you see this meeting as playing into the meeting which follows up in Vientiane at the end of the month, how do you see the process folding into each other?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I don';t know that there';s an automatic link Geoffrey because there are different memberships in the two bodies. But there';s a lot of common membership, particularly in so far as countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia and Singapore are members of ASEAN and they have a dialogue with other countries that are also at this meeting. It';s all in, that way, part of a continuum but they are two separate bodies.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister, the Bogor goals can';t be met can they? They';re not on track to (inaudible) free and open trade with developed countries (inaudible).
PRIME MINISTER:
Well that';s still in precise terms a hard ask. But we are making a lot of progress and of course the real progress that we';re making on a bilateral basis is very important to us. We have finally crossed all the t's and dotted the i';s on the Free Trade Agreement with the United States and that';s a very important development. And also of course our economic relationship with China has bounded ahead quite remarkably and whether or not we have a Free Trade Agreement with China we';ve got a very strong economic relationship with that country. So it';s all pretty positive, it';s all upside.
JOURNALIST:
Upside from (inaudible) without the goals being met, it';d be upside even without those goals?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well you never want to benchmark an organisation or a relationship by a particular thing by a particular date, you have to look at the overall state of play and say have trading relations between Australia and many of the countries in this grouping improved? Yes they have. Is there freer trade? Yes there is. Is there a long way to go to achieve the ideal? Of course there is.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister, what sort of progress would you like to make towards a Free Trade Agreement with China in your talks with President#8230;
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we';re having a scoping study done at the moment and I don';t know that we should interrupt that process. One more question.
JOURNALIST:
Do you think an APEC-wide Free Trade Agreement is viable?
PRIME MINISTER:
I think there are some problems about that because of the different characters of the economy, I don';t think that was the original proposition.
[ends]