S'PORE, AUSTRALIA AGREE TO EXTEND USE OF TRAINING AREA FOR ANOTHER 10 YEARS

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Teo Chee Hean and the Australian Minister for Defence Joel Fitzgibbon signed a new Shoalwater Bay Training Area (SWBTA) Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) on 31 May.

This took place on the sidelines of the 8th Shangri-La Dialogue, which both ministers attended, from 29 to 31 May at the Shangri-La Hotel.

The new agreement allows the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) to continue training at the SWBTA in Australia until 2019.

The rough and challenging terrain of the SWBTA provides the SAF with a realistic training environment to hone its operational readiness. Exercise Wallaby, one of the SAF's largest unilateral training exercises, has been conducted at the SWBTA annually since 1990.

The signing of the MOA highlights the excellent bilateral defence ties shared by Singapore and Australia, whose defence forces interact regularly through various bilateral and multilateral training exercises, professional exchanges and attendance at each other's courses.

This MOA signing follows an earlier signing of a Memorandum of Understanding on Defence Cooperation by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in August 2008.