Southeast Asian foreign ministers will decide whether Australia will attend this year's inaugural East Asia summit when they meet in Laos this month, a Malaysian official said today.

"Australia's attendance at the East Asian summit will be decided at the Vientiane meeting," a senior foreign ministry official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Australia has been trying to secure an invitation to the East Asia summit, an emerging regional trade group comprising the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) and its "Plus 3" partners - China, Japan and South Korea.

Canberra last month said it was prepared to sign an Asean non-aggression pact which the group has laid down as a precondition to Australia attending the summit, to be held in Kuala Lumpur in December.

Asean called on Canberra to sign the treaty after Prime Minister John Howard last year raised the possibility of Australia launching pre-emptive strikes against terrorist bases throughout the region.

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said Australia would sign the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation as long as it did not interfere with other alliances, including Canberra's military ties with the United States.

Cold War relic

Australia had previously refused to sign the treaty, which bans signatories from using violence to settle conflicts in the region, with Howard calling it a Cold War relic.

"We see the East Asia summit as the birth of a growing East Asian community, so it makes good sense for the region, for Australia, to be involved," Downer said.

"If the price is signing the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, we'll do that."

The Asean meeting includes a July 28-29 post-ministerial dialogue between the grouping and its key trading partners, notably the US, European Union, China, Japan and Russia.

It also includes the Asean Regional Forum, the only official security meeting in the Asia-Pacific region.