EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas hailed the UK partnership in May as a new model for international agreements.
The terms of the partnerships include working together on maritime security, freedom of navigation, cybersecurity, hybrid threats, foreign interference, counterterrorism and international peacekeeping.
With Japan, for instance, the EU partnership has led to defence industry co-operation despite strong competition between the two sides in areas such as shipbuilding. Australia awarded a $10 billion contract to Japanese company Mitsubishi in August for three new frigates, rejecting Germany company TKMS.
European Australian Business Council chairman Duncan Lewis said the two sides of the proposed agreement shared the same values and should be working together to deal with strategic uncertainty in the world.
“The EU has concluded that the Asia-Pacific region is inextricably linked to global security and therefore their own security and safety,” said Lewis, a former ASIO chief and Australian ambassador to the EU and NATO.
“We have much to gain from a strategic and defence partnership with the EU, including access to co-operative defence procurement and technical development opportunities.
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“Australian defence industry, the Australian Defence Force and our nation’s security preparedness would benefit from a quick but well-negotiated SDP [security and defence partnership].”
Behind the defence push is a growing belief in the EU that security in Europe is linked to the Asia-Pacific because of the “no-limits” partnership struck by Russian President Vladimir Putin with Chinese President Xi Jinping three weeks before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Chinese companies are making motors and electronics for drones based on Iranian designs and manufactured by Russia, sometimes using munitions from North Korea. Russia has scaled up daily manufacturing to the point where it can launch hundreds of drones against Ukraine in a single night.
Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles framed the partnership as a way to tighten the connections between Europe and Asia.
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“While our regions are geographically distant, security in Europe and the Indo-Pacific is increasingly interconnected,” a spokesperson for Marles said.
“A security and defence partnership will strengthen our collaboration on shared security challenges, enhance strategic dialogue, and create new opportunities for joint defence procurement.”
A spokeswoman for the Department of Foreign Affairs said the partnership would provide a framework for co-operation in areas such as defence industry, cyber and counterterrorism.
Griffith University associate professor Matthew Sussex noted in June that the partnership did not need to be a “complex and granular” accord to work for both sides because the objective was to build on the agreement over time.
“The threats we face, our political and normative alignment, and our preference for free and liberal trade are all shared,” he wrote in an analysis for the Lowy Institute.
“And while it will not magically smooth the complex and fraught security order we must navigate, it would be a missed opportunity if we did not try to chart that course together.”
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