Several governments joined Japan Tuesday in criticizing China’s latest bid to carve out a zone of control in the East China Sea, including Australia summoning Beijing’s ambassador to voice opposition over the move.

Who would have expected a neophyte Australian foreign minister to get policy right on Sri Lanka while India’s prime minister scores yet another foreign policy own goal in his backyard? Julie Bishop rejected calls for Australia to boycott the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Colombo on Nov. 15, insisting that Sri Lanka’s human rights are better advanced by engagement than isolation. Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott duly attended.

Australia's spy agencies have attempted to listen in on the personal phone calls of the Indonesian president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and have targeted the mobile phones of his wife, senior ministers and confidants, a top secret document from whistleblower Edward Snowden reveals. The document, dated November 2009, names the president and nine of his inner circle as targets of the surveillance, including the vice-president, Boediono, who last week visited Australia.

Uluru, also known as Ayers Rock, is one of Australia’s premier tourist destinations and a driving force behind the Northern Territory’s $1.5 billion tourism economy. The awe-inspiring red monolith, the largest in the world, attracts climbers eager for a view from its 348 meter peak and trekkers who are keen to walk around its 9.4 kilometer base. Pleas from local Aborigines, as well as new government restrictions, may put an end to both activities – a worrying prospect for tour operators and other local industries that rely on the natural attraction.

The 13th meeting of ministers of the Indian Ocean Rim Association in Perth yesterday was the first chaired by Australia in the organisation’s 16-year history. Australia succeeded India and Indonesia became the new vice-chair. The IORA consists of 20 member states. They reflect the remarkable diversity of our Indian Ocean region and represent from small island countries, such as Comoros and Seychelles, to G20 members such as India, Indonesia and Australia.

Canberra’s foreign policies are a puzzle. Australia depends on China to take 35 percent of its exports. It may have to depend even more as its manufacturing base implodes — past mistakes mean it is about to lose almost all its car manufacturing industry. Yet Australia’s new conservative government has chosen this moment to tell the world that it wants to cooperate with Japan and the United States in their anti-China policies.

After declaring the nation “open for business,” Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has set a target of achieving free trade deals with China, Japan and South Korea within just 12 months. Can the recently elected leader succeed where his predecessors failed? Having stated at the APEC summit in Bali that he wished to swiftly conclude eight years of negotiations with China, Abbott told reporters at last week’s East Asian Summit in Brunei that he was adding the nation’s second and third-biggest trading partners to the target list.

What if China was beating the US as its own super-power game in the Pacific and we didn’t even notice? While Washington distracts itself with shutdown shenanigans and failed attempts to control the situation in the Middle East, president Obama’s “pivot to Asia” looks increasingly shaky. Beijing is quietly filling the gap, signing multi-billion dollar trade deals with Indonesia and calling for a regional infrastructure bank.