WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump will meet Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on October 20 in Washington, a White House official said on Tuesday.
Albanese, reelected as leader of a center-left Labor government in a May national election, has yet to meet Trump, after a meeting scheduled on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Canada in June was canceled when the president left early.
The allies have much to discuss, including the multi-billion dollar AUKUS project, also involving Britain, to provide Australia with nuclear-powered attack submarines to counter China’s ambitions in the Indo-Pacific, which is currently under Pentagon review.
U.S. Under Secretary of Defense Elbridge Colby, a public critic of AUKUS, is leading the Pentagon review. He said last year that submarines were a scarce, critical commodity, and U.S. industry could not produce enough to meet American demand.
Colby’s office has said the review will be completed in the northern hemisphere autumn.
On Tuesday, a senior U.S. State Department official said he understood the review would be completed in the autumn, but was not sure of the exact timing. He said it involved wide coordination between the Pentagon, the State Department and other agencies.
“Ultimately, what this is about is making sure that AUKUS benefits America and that the United States Government writ large is in full support behind it,” he told reporters.
Australia, which has already paid about $1 billion as part of ongoing contributions to support the expansion of American submarine shipyards, has maintained it is confident AUKUS will proceed.
Under pressure from Washington to increase defense spending, Australia this month announced an extra A$12 billion ($8 billion) to upgrade a shipyard in Western Australia for AUKUS submarine maintenance.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt; additional reporting by David Brunnstrom and Humeyra Pamuk; writing by Bhargav Acharya; Editing by Stephen Coates)
