Canberra – Australia and Indonesia will co-host a terrorism summit early next year, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer announced today.
Mr Downer met with his Indonesian counterpart Hassan Wirayuda in Canberra today, where the two agreed to co-host a regional meeting.
"Amongst other topics that the foreign minister and I discussed we agreed that Australia and Indonesia would co-host a regional ministerial conference on counter terrorism early next year," Mr Downer told parliament.
"And we've been able to work through some of the broad details of who will be invited to that conference and the nature of that conference." Mr Downer said Australia and Indonesia had worked well together since the Bali bomb blasts which killed more than 200 people including 88 Australians.
"Both Hassan Wirayuda and I believe that the more that we can do to contribute to strengthening regional co-operation on counter terrorism the better," he said.
"This will be a very major step forward I believe in enhancing regional co-operation right across the region into the future." Australia and Indonesia have previously co-hosted a regional summit on people smuggling.