Australian foreign minister Julie Bishop has played down the prospect of conflict between China and the US over the South China Sea but warned Beijing not to declare an air defence zone (ADIZ) in the region.
Speaking to the Lowy Institute in Sydney, the Foreign Minister expressed hope that China and the US would avoid conflict.
“I believe that the United States and China have a very good understanding of how catastrophic it would be for there to be a conflict that engaged those two powerful nations,” she said.
The Foreign Minister said Australia was concerned that any unilateral action in the region could “could raise tensions, could risk miscalculation or misjudgment and could ultimately end in some form of some form of conflict”.