Australia wants to join East ASEAN Growth Area

Australia wants to join East ASEAN Growth Area

MANILA (AFP): Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans said
yesterday that he hoped Australia's Northern Territory could
become part of the East ASEAN Growth Area (EAGA) envisioned
between Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.

During a meeting with President Fidel Ramos, Evans also
discussed the creation of more business links between the
Northern Territory city of Darwin and the southern provinces of
the Philippines and further Australian investment in this
country.

A palace statement quoted Evans as telling Ramos that the
thrust of the northern territories was now towards the Southeast
Asian nations, just as the southern Philippines was looking
south, towards the same area, in line with the EAGA.

The Philippines is one of six member countries of ASEAN, the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations, a non-military grouping.
Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand are the other
members.

"We think there's room for northern Australia to be part of
EAGA. We are intrigued by this concept, we want to be part of
it," Evans told a press conference earlier.

Evans, who had been on a five-day visit to the Philippines,
also stressed the need to find such complementarities between the
Australian city of Darwin and the southern portion of Mindanao,
noting that Darwin was closer to Davao, Mindanao's main trading
city, than it was to Canberra.

He said the Darwin Committee, an Australian-commissioned
group, would remain in this country to look into expanding
economic relations with Southeast Asia.

Evans, who earlier toured growth areas in Mindanao as well as
the Subic free port in the northern Philippines, agreed that the
Philippines had greatly improved as a site for foreign
investment.

"Now the rest of the world is taking notice and Australia is
not an exception. We want to be part of the action," he said.