Prime Minister welcomes prospect of meeting China leader Xi
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has indicated he is keen to meet with China's President next week, after years of strained relations between the countries.
There are growing expectations Albanese and Xi Jinping will meet next week when both leaders attend two international gatherings, the G20 leaders' summit in Bali, Indonesia, and the APEC leaders meeting in Thailand.
There are growing expectations that the two leaders will meet on the sidelines of one of those summits.
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There is expectation Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will meet China President Xi Jinping later this month. AP
Albanese yesterday indicated he is open to a meeting with Xi following years of strained Australia-China tensions over trade sanctions, the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, Beijing's growing influence in the Asia Pacific region and human rights abuses in China.
"I've made it very clear that dialogue is a good thing. And so if a meeting is arranged with Xi, then that would be a positive thing," Albanese said.
"We are organising a range of meetings, but they haven't been finalised and locked in at this point in time."
This year the relationship has slightly thawed after the election of the Labor federal government and earlier this week Foreign Minister Penny Wong had a phone conversation with her Chinese counterpart that's paved the way for a dialogue between the two leaders next week.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said relations between the two nations had undergone "positive change".
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Chinese trade sanctions against Australian exporters have seen Canberra-Beijing relations hit a new low. AP
Xi's last official bilateral meeting with an Australian prime minister was with Malcolm Turnbull in 2017, when relations were far less strained.
Meanwhile, WA Premier Mark McGowan says he is committed to strengthening ties with China after he met with representatives with up to 30 state-owned entities and Chinese investors yesterday.
Hundreds of WA jobs are dependent on China, with the country accounting for more than half of the state's total goods exports.
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