Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said in Beijing on April 11, 2014, that he anticipates closer military cooperation and joint military exercises with China. He added that, after the state dinner and bilateral talks, Chinese President Xi Jinping had accepted his invitation to address both houses of the Australian parliament later this year when he visits Australia for the G20 summit in Brisbane. Describing the talks he said "We had a very warm and constructive discussion last night." 

Mr Abbott also said he was "quite confident" of exchanges with China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) and "multilateral exercises in the months and years ahead".‘‘Thanks to the rotating elements of US Marines in Darwin, there’s potential for multilateral exercises in Australia involving the US,’’ 

Australia's largest media company, Fairfax Media, revealed last week that the PLA has asked to operate under Australian command in the US-led Rim of the Pacific maritime exercises, which will see the navies of more than 20 nations converge around Hawaii for warfare drills in July.

China's official news agency Xinhua and state-run media outlets like the English-language China Daily prominently front-paged Abbott's meeting with Xi Jinping.