Australia, South Korea and Malaysia are jointly working on a plan to deal with the rise of violent extremism in the region. The plan is due to be released at the East Asian Summit in   November. 
Foreign minister Julie Bishop revealed the co-operation on Friday after the first formal talks between Australian and Korean defence and foreign ministers in Australia where a series of new co-operation measures between the two countries on defence, police and disaster management were agreed.
The two countries - which are each large trading partners of China - also said they had a common interest in seeing the development of a code of conduct for dealing with tensions between China and several Southeast Asian countries on territorial disputes in the South China Sea. In a notable comment Korean foreign minister Yun Byung-se said his country wanted to do more to engage with other countries in the region on challenging issues including "the China matter."
Both Ms Bishop and Mr Yun talked up growing co-operation between the two countries via a new middle-power group which also includes Indonesia, Mexico and Turkey which Mr Yun said had removed the tyranny of distance between the countries.
Mr Yun said was considering ways for Korea to contribute more to the refugee crisis being caused by violent extremism in the Middle East but he did not say whether his country would join any military action in the region.