UK minister: Australian submarines will assure neighbours

Australia's shift to nuclear-powered submarines will assure its South Pacific neighbors of its commitment to regional security, the United Kingdom's Minister of State for the Indo-Pacific said Monday.

Australia will announce in March what type of submarine powered with U.S. nuclear technology it wants to build under a deal with the United States and Britain revealed in September last year.

Anne-Marie Trevelyan said she expects the three nations to work closely together to deliver a fleet of eight submarines.

"It's going to be a really exciting project and really importantly will assure, I think, not only for Australia, but for the Indo-Pacific region, for those Pacific islands that assurance that Australia's commitment to their security is unassailable," Trevelyan told the National Press Club in Canberra.

The previous Australian government infuriated French President Emmanuel Macron by canceling a contract for a French-built fleet of 12 conventionally-powered submarines worth 90 billion Australian dollars ($66 billion).

It opted instead for nuclear-powered versions.

This month, Macron described Australia going nuclear as a "confrontation with China."

Trevelyan said she disagreed with Macron's stance that Australia should have stayed with the French contract.

"The Pacific is a big place. Having nuclear-powered submarines means you can go further for longer, it's a practical question," Trevelyan said.

"The French navy has nuclear-powered submarines. What they were proposing to build for (Australia) diesel submarines, is not what the French use," she added.

Australia's government, elected in May after nine years in opposition, has been trying to build closer relations with its neighbors in a region where China is exerting more influence.

The government has accused the previous leadership of Australia's worst foreign policy failure in the Pacific since World War II with China's signing of a security pact with the Solomon Islands in April.

That accord has raised fears that a Chinese naval base might be established in the South Pacific.