June 3, 2024 (Singapore) — Australian Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Richard Marles said that the Australia-Philippine defense and security relations are at their “high point.”

Deputy Prime Minister Marles made the remarks on Sunday at the start of the Philippine-Australia defense ministers formal bilateral meeting during the 21st International Institute for Strategic Studies Shangri-La Dialogue.

“Our relations with the Philippines are at their high point. We very much welcome this development,” Deputy Prime Minister Marles told Secretary Gilberto C. Teodoro, Jr., who immediately thanked his counterpart for his assessment of their relations.

For his part, Secretary Teodoro told Deputy Prime Minister Marles that he is looking forward to bringing the Australia-Philippine defense and security relations to “greater heights” as they jointly cooperate in strengthening the rules-based international order.

Secretary Teodoro and Minister Marles recalled their commitments during the last May meeting of defense secretaries and ministers from the United States, Australia, Japan, and the Philippines at the US Indo-Pacific Command Headquarters in Hawaii.

During the Hawaii meeting, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin III, Minister Marles, Japanese Minister of Defense Kihara Minoru, and Secretary Teodoro made a pact to strengthen their cooperation amid escalating tensions in the West Philippine Sea and the broader South China Sea.

The four countries committed to work more closely in ensuring that international laws are observed in the high seas and waterways.

The defense secretaries and ministers of the four countries held their maiden meeting in Singapore in 2023.