Australia hosted the 2002 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) at Coolum, Queensland.
Following widescale electoral fraud and human rights violations in Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe, the CHOGM established a troika of Commonwealth statesmen: chaired by John Howard and also composed of President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, it met in London and agreed that Zimbabwe should be suspended from the Commonwealth.
The troika met a further time in Nigeria, but with little outcome.
Howard continued to lobby within the Commonwealth for further action, but faced heated opposition from Mbeki and other leaders.
Howard wrote in his 2010 biography that Zimbabwe had been the "just about the most demoralising foreign affairs issue" he ever faced as prime minister.

China entered into an agreement in 2002 to buy $25 billion worth of Australian natural gas.
 The prices have remained frozen for China and will remain so until 2031.

The Howard Government signed a Free Trade Agreement with Singapore in February 2003 and in 2004, Australia and Thailand concluded a bilateral Free Trade Agreement.

July 2003 saw the Howard Government dispatch forces to the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI), following a wide scale collapse of law and order in that nation.
Led by Australia, and with the participation of regional partners like New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, the move was part of an activist regional foreign policy, which Howard described as a "paradigm shift" in which Australia was insisting on "reduced corruption, better economic management and improved criminal justice as conditions of ongoing aid".

By 2003, trade with China had tripled since arrival in office of the Howard Government, and Chinese President Hu Jintao selected Australia as his first international port of call after taking office.
Howard invited Hu to become the first Chinese leader to address the Australian Parliament.
Over successive days in October 2003, first President George W. Bush of the United States and then President Hu of China addressed joint sittings of the Australian Parliament.
In his 2010 memoir Lazarus Rising, Howard wrote that through both "coincidence and deliberation", no foreign policy events in the course of his prime ministership "came anywhere near the symbolism of these two days" and that, while he still judged the US to be the more important partner and intimate friend, he believed that:
In one unmistakeable gesture, Australia was telling the world that it was possible, simultaneously, to have close relations with both the United States and China.

In 2004, diplomatic relations resumed between Australia and North Korea.
Australia hosted the 2002 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) at Coolum, Queensland. Following widescale electoral fraud and human rights violations in Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe, the CHOGM established a troika of Commonwealth statesmen: chaired by John Howard and also composed of President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, it met in London and agreed that Zimbabwe should be suspended from the Commonwealth. The troika met a further time in Nigeria, but with little outcome. Howard continued to lobby within the Commonwealth for further action, but faced heated opposition from Mbeki and other leaders. Howard wrote in his 2010 biography that Zimbabwe had been the "just about the most demoralising foreign affairs issue" he ever faced as prime minister.
China entered into an agreement in 2002 to buy $25 billion worth of Australian natural gas.  The prices have remained frozen for China and will remain so until 2031.
The Howard Government signed a Free Trade Agreement with Singapore in February 2003 and in 2004, Australia and Thailand concluded a bilateral Free Trade Agreement.
July 2003 saw the Howard Government dispatch forces to the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI), following a wide scale collapse of law and order in that nation. Led by Australia, and with the participation of regional partners like New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, the move was part of an activist regional foreign policy, which Howard described as a "paradigm shift" in which Australia was insisting on "reduced corruption, better economic management and improved criminal justice as conditions of ongoing aid".
By 2003, trade with China had tripled since arrival in office of the Howard Government, and Chinese President Hu Jintao selected Australia as his first international port of call after taking office. Howard invited Hu to become the first Chinese leader to address the Australian Parliament. Over successive days in October 2003, first President George W. Bush of the United States and then President Hu of China addressed joint sittings of the Australian Parliament. In his 2010 memoir Lazarus Rising, Howard wrote that through both "coincidence and deliberation", no foreign policy events in the course of his prime ministership "came anywhere near the symbolism of these two days" and that, while he still judged the US to be the more important partner and intimate friend, he believed that:
In one unmistakeable gesture, Australia was telling the world that it was possible, simultaneously, to have close relations with both the United States and China.
In 2004, diplomatic relations resumed between Australia and North Korea.
Howard Government