Opening Remarks, Singapore

SUBJECTS: Australia-US relationship. 

PETE HEGSETH, US SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: It is great to be here with the Deputy Prime Minister. You’ve had a chance to be at the Pentagon. 

RICHARD MARLES, DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER: Indeed. 

SECRETARY HEGSETH: We’re in touch regularly. Just a long-standing, incredibly important partnership with our friends in Australia, and it’s as strong and true today as it’s ever been. I saw it in person in Afghanistan, working alongside Australians who became not just fellow warriors but friends and that at the highest levels continues. And so we look forward to the conversation here in finding ways to further it.  

DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER: It’s great to see you again Pete. We had a really fantastic first meeting in D.C. back in February and you paid me the great compliment of being the first of your foreign counterparts that you met. And one of the things that really struck me when I first met Pete was what you just said then – that when you gave service in Afghanistan you spoke about having worked alongside Australian service personnel. And it really does speak to the depth of the relationship between Australia and the United States, but the defence relationship between Australia and the United States. It couldn’t have been a better first meeting between the two of us. We’re really, as a government, excited about taking the relationship forward and we feel really optimistic about it. And welcome to your first Shangri-La. One of the things that really struck me in that first meeting was the focus that you had, Pete and that the Administration has on the Indo-Pacific and obviously this is an opportunity to give expression to that. But we really welcome that and we very much look forward to this meeting, but also working together over the next few years. 

SECRETARY HEGSETH: Yep, that’s why we’re here. It’s a partnership as strong and robust as it’s ever been, and as important considering the issues we face in the region and the world. 

ENDS