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Sue Green

THE Australian Prime Minister, Mr Paul Keating, is to visit Hongkong and China next month on his first major overseas trip since his triumphant re-election in March.

   In a boost to China's international standing, he will be the first Australian leader to travel to China since the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.

  Details of the visit have yet to be finalised, but Mr Keating's spokesman told the South China Morning Post he was planning to be in China from June 24 to June 29, after a three-day visit to South Korea.

  His itinerary will include Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai.

  He will most likely spend June 30 in Hongkong and meet the Governor, Mr Chris Patten, and business leaders, including members of the Australian Chamber of Commerce.

  The visit reflects Mr Keating's foreign policy and trade objectives. During the election campaign he unveiled a plan to spend A$60 million (HK$326 million) in the next four years to boost the integration of Australia's economy with Asia and improve the country's image in the region.

  He also used the campaign to launch his push for an expanded role for the Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation group (APEC), of which both Hongkong and China are members, and for opening up trade and investment in the region.

  He stopped short of proposing a free trade zone among the 15 APEC members, but laid the groundwork for it. He backed uniform standards in areas such as communications equipment, pharmaceuticals, electronics and labelling, with harmonised trade and investment rules and dispute-settling.

  Mr Keating's plan presents the Chinese leadership with the chance to expand its own influence in APEC.

  China, Hongkong and South Korea are Australia's major Asian trading partners after Japan.

  South Korea, which last year bought A$3.4 billion worth of goods from Australia, has been tipped to overtake the US as Australia's second biggest export market by the end of the decade.

  But the managing director of Austrade, Mr Ralph Evans, predicted it would be the combined markets of China (A$1.8 billion worth of Australian goods in 1992) and Hongkong (A$3.6 billion) that would take the number two spot.

  Mr Keating's visit comes as China is working hard to boost its international image and, with that, its chances of hosting the 2000 Olympic Games.

  The visit is a boost to China, given Australia's strong human rights stance and the limited number of world leaders who have visited since June 4, 1989.

  Mr Keating's visit to Hongkong is more in the nature of a stopover, despite the fact that he has not visited previously and that Hongkong's imports from Australia in 1992 were up 22 per cent on the previous year.

  Just how much he will be able to accomplish in a single day, after what is expected to be a gruelling schedule in China, is open to question.

  However, the visit is not without potential pitfalls, coming as it does after a week of bridge-building with China.

  Australia's Foreign Minister, Senator Gareth Evans, has been a strong backer of Mr Patten's reform plans, after being encouraged by the United Democrats' leader, Mr Martin Lee Chu-ming.

  In taking such a strong line Australia incurred China's displeasure - it complained publicly and officially, but there has been no further action.

  It seems likely that Mr Keating's future statements on the issue will be couched in more general terms - support for democracy, rather that support for specific reform plans.

  For Mr Keating the visit to all three Asian destinations, after a visit to New Zealand later this month, is a vital one. There is potential to boost his image at home and in the region at a time when Australia, with more than one million unemployed, is in the economic doldrums.

       With Australian and Chinese businesses signing joint venture agreements at the rate of almost one a week and with such large export markets at stake, he must protect Australia's trade interests while pushing his plan for greater Australian involvement andacceptance in Asia.

  If Mr Keating makes headway in his plans for an expanded APEC - a plan in which the US has also expressed interest - it will give him valuable ammunition for his next overseas destination, Washington, later this year.



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