Natasha Chaku/PTI / Melbourne Nov 30, 2009, 14:59 IST
The Australian city of Perth will host the 2011 Commonwealth Heads of Government (CHOGM) meeting, the country's foreign minister said today after the latest summit of the grouping ended in Port of Spain.
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said that CHOGM leaders had decided unanimously on Australia after he and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had put it "in the mix" of countries offering to host the meeting.
The two-day meeting of CHOGM, attended by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh among other top leaders, concluded at Port of Spain in Trinidad and Tobago yesterday.
Smith said Sri Lanka and Mauritius were the other countries under consideration, with Sri Lanka winning the right to host the meeting in 2013 and Mauritius in 2015.
"That brings a very significant Indian Ocean, South Asian and African emphasis for the next three CHOGMs and of course given that focus, Perth was the obvious host city," the Perth MP was quoted by media here as saying.
Smith said the British Queen will also attend the Perth meeting of the heads of governments of Commonwealth, a grouping of mostly former British colonies.
Australia previously hosted CHOGM in 1981 in Melbourne and in 2002 at Coolum on Queensland's Sunshine Coast.
"This is a big international event and a terrific opportunity to showcase not only Australia but also from our point of view, if you like, our selfish local perspective, to showcase Perth and WA (Western Australia)," Smith said.
He also said the meeting of the 54-member Commonwealth countries played a "significant" role in world affairs in recent years, dealing with measures to tackle trouble-spots like Zimbabwe and Fiji and more recently ousting Fiji as a member-nation.
"And we saw in Port of Spain how one meeting, one gathering of foreign leaders, can build political momentum for one policy item or event," he said.
"This one was seen very much as a run-up to Copenhagen (climate change meet)...A lot of effort went into building momentum for Copenhagen," he said.
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