{"id":602564,"date":"2026-04-12T18:50:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T18:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/602564\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T18:50:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T18:50:13","slug":"australia-seeks-fuel-surety-in-crisis-driven-asia-trip","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/602564\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia seeks fuel surety in crisis-driven Asia trip"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"et_pb_title_meta_container\">April 13, 2026 03:30 | <a href=\"https:\/\/michaelwest.com.au\/category\/external-feeds\/aap-news\/\" rel=\"category tag nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">News<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The prime minister will try to shore up supplies of fuel and other essential commodities in a four-day trip to key trading partners.<\/p>\n<p>Anthony Albanese will travel to Brunei and Malaysia on Tuesday as efforts to safeguard the flow of petrol, diesel and other critical imports ramp up amid ongoing instability spurred by conflict in the Middle East.<\/p>\n<p>Both nations play important roles in Australia\u2019s fuel-supply chains and the trip will build on a recent visit to another vital exporter, Singapore.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Albanese said bolstering ties with regional partners was essential to maintaining energy security during uncertain times.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are taking every step to reinforce relationships and engage with key partners to keep our fuel supply flowing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/b4adf7c0-31ea-4184-b3b6-fc535475506b.jpg\" alt=\"Albanese \"\/>After a trip to Singapore to secure fuel supplies, Anthony Albanese heads to Brunei and Malaysia. (Tom White\/AAP PHOTOS)<\/p>\n<p>The prime minister will meet the sultan of Brunei to discuss energy, food security and the movement of essential goods.<\/p>\n<p>Brunei provides about nine per cent of Australia\u2019s diesel imports.<\/p>\n<p>Talks will also focus on deepening an existing partnership that was formed in 2023.<\/p>\n<p>He will meet his Malaysian counterpart, Anwar Ibrahim, to discuss fuel supply.<\/p>\n<p>Malaysia is Australia\u2019s third-largest source of refined fuel and supplies 10 per cent of Australian fertiliser imports.<\/p>\n<p>Foreign Minister Penny Wong will also meet her counterparts from Malaysia and Brunei on the four-day visit.<\/p>\n<p>The trip comes as the government begins rolling out a $20 million advertising campaign asking the public to help conserve fuel by changing their driving habits or leaving the car at home.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/a8ecae80-07f2-4c84-b8a6-c6776a981b83.jpg\" alt=\"Wong \"\/>Foreign Minister Penny Wong will meet with her counterparts in Brunei and Malaysia. (Mick Tsikas\/AAP PHOTOS)<\/p>\n<p>But Curtin University sustainability expert Peter Newman criticised the move, saying similar campaigns had been evaluated in the past and shown to have virtually no impact.<\/p>\n<p>He also described as \u201cdesperately stupid\u201d a West Australian government plan to develop a state-based diesel stockpile, independent of national fuel reserves.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s going to be very expensive and difficult to even access that (extra) diesel and petrol (on the global market),\u201d Professor Newman told AAP.<\/p>\n<p>In comparison, he said it was a \u201cno brainer\u201d for Australia to speed up the transition to electrified transport.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can be a world leader in that, not a world leader in how much (petrol and diesel) we can store up,\u201d Prof Newman said.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"m-a-box-avatar-url\" href=\"https:\/\/michaelwest.com.au\/author\/aap-news\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"200\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AAP-Logo1-400x400.jpg\" class=\"attachment-200x200 size-200x200\" alt=\"AAP News\" itemprop=\"image\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Australian Associated Press is the beating heart of Australian news. AAP is Australia\u2019s only independent national newswire and has been delivering accurate, reliable and fast news content to the media industry, government and corporate sector for 85 years. We keep Australia informed.<\/p>\n<p>Latest stories from our writers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"April 13, 2026 03:30 | News The prime minister will try to shore up supplies of fuel and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":602565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":{"0":"post-602564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=602564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/602565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=602564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=602564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=602564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}