Bali: Foreign Minister Penny Wong says Australia will not budge on protecting its national interests but has declared her meeting with China counterpart Wang Yi an important first step on the road to mending ties with Beijing.

In the latest sign of renewed communication between Australia and China, Wong and Wang met in Bali on Friday night after a G20 meeting, the first such get-together of foreign ministers from the two nations for nearly three years.

Penny Wong and Wang Yi meet up in Bali on Friday night.Credit:Johannes P. Christo

Wong said the pair had spoken “frankly” and “listened carefully to each other’s priorities and concerns” on bilateral issues as well as regional and international security.

“This is the first step towards stabilising the relationship,” she said. “We are a government and a nation that has made certain decisions on the basis of our national interest, our national security and our sovereignty and we won’t be resiling from those.

“But we do think it’s in our interests, and we would stay say in China’s interests, for the relationship to be stabilised. That’s going to take time, that’s going to take effort, that’s going to take work and it’s going to take some nuance.”

Wong said she raised China’s $20 billion in trade sanctions as well as the detention of Australian journalist Cheng Lei and writer Yang Hengjun during the talks.

Asked what message Wang had delivered, she said: “I think the Chinese position is well known. Its different perspectives are well known and what was put to me reflected what we know China’s position to be.”

Irritated a by a range of issues including Australian anti-dumping trade measures and the barring of Chinese investments, China has said repeatedly that “concrete actions” are needed from Australia to reset ties.

Wong, however, reaffirmed on Friday it was up to Beijing to remove trade bans to help improve relations, saying such an outcome was in the best interests of both countries.

“That remains the government’s position, those trade blockages should be removed,” she said. “All of these issues will take some time. We will take one step at a time.

The ice-breaker between Wong and Wang after Friday’s G20 foreign ministers’ summit in Bali came only weeks after their competing tours of the Pacific, where China has been trying to extend its influence after signing a controversial security pact with Solomon Islands.

It followed another get-together on the sidelines of a defence conference in Singapore last month at which Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles and China Defence Minister Wei Fenghe met for more than an hour.

“We will walk the path towards stabilising the relationship carefully and in a considered way,” Wong said.

Wang is also meeting with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Bali on Saturday.Credit:Johannes P. Christo

On the eve of their meeting Wang had warned against parallels being drawn between Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s desire to reclaim Taiwan, saying Beijing “rejects any attempt to compare the Ukraine crisis with the Taiwan question and will firmly safeguard its core interests”.

Asked last week by The Australian Financial Review what lessons China should take the Russian war, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said it had shown that “attempts to impose change by force on a sovereign country meets resistance”.

The comment drew a sharp response from Chinese state media and China’s foreign ministry, which branded it “irresponsible”, but Wong took a more diplomatic tone on China and Taiwan on Friday.

“In relation to Taiwan, there’s a bipartisan position on One China policy. I think there’s a bipartisan position now that we support the status quo and that there be no unilateral change to that status quo,” she said.

Wong also met on Friday with United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the sidelines of the G20 meeting as well as the foreign ministers of France, Germany and Canada.

On Friday morning she joined a gathering of Pacific Islands foreign ministers virtually and will travel to Fiji for the Pacific Islands Forum leaders meeting in Fiji next week.

Wang is due to meet with Blinken on Saturday before flying out of Bali.

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