PM Transcripts

I EL : N6 v593 y 15: 14 No. 008 P. 01/ 0 11
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PRIME MINISTER 179
STATEMENT BY THE PRIME MINISTER THE HON P J KEATING MP
APEC LEADERS MEETING SEATTLE
At the invitation of President Clinton, I will be attending an informal meeting of
leaders of the APEC economies in Seattle on 19-20 November.
This historic meeting will otter an unprecedented opportunity for leaders to
discuss In an informal setting their own national economic experiences, their
vision for the region into the twenty-first century, and the ways in which APEC
can help to maintain the economic momentum in the Asia-Pacific region, the
fastest growing area of the world.
I will also take the opportunity at the Seattle meeting to have bilateral
meetings with a number of the leaders present, including President Ziang
Zemnin of China, President Kim Young Sam of the Republic of Korea,
Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai of Thailand and Prime Minister Hosokawa of
Japan. The Seattle meeting will follow Immediately after the fifth APEC ministerial
meeting at which the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Senator Evans, and the
Minister for Trade, Senator Cook, will represent Australia.
The ministerial meeting will discuss a trade and investment framework for
APEC, and APEC's 1994 work program. It will also discuss the report of -the
Eminent Persons' Group which was formed to look at the opportunities for
trade in the region over the longer term, and on which Mr Neville Wran
represented Australia. I expect that both the ministerial meeting and the
leaders' meeting will want to look at ways in which APEC members can help
bring about a satisfactory outcome to the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade
negotiations. The APEC economies represent forty per cent of the world's population and
are responsible for half its production. Three quarters of Australia's exports
go to APEC members and around two-thirds of our imports are sourced from
APEC. Canberra November 1993