In a significant step for transatlantic and Indo-Pacific alignment, the European Union and Australia today announced a landmark Security and Defence Partnership (SDP) and concluded negotiations on a long-awaited Free Trade Agreement (FTA), with both sides also agreeing to launch formal negotiations for Australia's association with Horizon Europe.
The SDP was signed by HR/VP Kaja Kallas alongside Australian Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong, while the FTA text was finalised during a leaders' meeting in Canberra between Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
For INSTAR and the broader community working on EU Digital Partnerships, the agreement carries particular relevance. The Security and Defence Partnership will boost cooperation across cyber, economic security, and countering hybrid threats Defence Ministers — areas that sit directly at the heart of INSTAR's mandate to align international standards in AI, cybersecurity, quantum, and digital infrastructure.
On the security front, Australia and the EU committed to strengthening cooperation in areas including crisis management, maritime security, and disruptive technologies, including artificial intelligence. This commitment to technology governance signals that Australia — already one of INSTAR's key partner countries — is deepening its engagement with European frameworks on the digital and security agenda.
The trade dimension equally reinforces the strategic direction of EU Digital Partnerships. The EU is set to secure access to critical raw materials from Australia, including aluminium, lithium and manganese, vital for the EU's overall economic security and for enabling the digital and green transitions that underpin many of the technology domains INSTAR works across.
The agreement also opens a new frontier for research collaboration. The launch of formal negotiations for Australia's association with Horizon Europe — the world's largest funding programme for research and innovation — could create new opportunities for joint work on the standards and technologies that INSTAR's partners are actively shaping.
The deal is the latest addition to the EU's agreements with the strategic Indo-Pacific region, following the conclusion of FTA negotiations with Indonesia in September 2025 and India in January 2026. Taken together, these moves reflect the EU's accelerating effort to build trusted partnerships with like-minded democracies — the same strategic logic that underpins INSTAR's work with Australia, Canada, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and the USA.
As the EU continues to expand and deepen its Digital Partnerships, today's agreement with Australia provides a stronger institutional foundation for the kind of regulatory and standards alignment that INSTAR is working to achieve across AI, cybersecurity, 5G/6G, quantum, IoT, Digital ID and data technologies.
