The uranium supply agreement that China and Australia signed on Monday should be regarded as a common bilateral pact, an editorial in The Straits Times, an English daily in Singapore, said Tuesday.

"It is less taxing to see the deal as simply one of the most mutually beneficial among the scores of bilateral pacts countries have entered into," the commentary noted.

It said that China is entitled to have such a national planning imperative that requires uranium to enhance its electricity production so as to meet its industry and home-consumption needs and reduce pollution.

It added that Australian supplies of iron ore, copper, nickel, aluminum and gas, besides uranium, "have kept Chinese industry at full blast," while Australia has gained greatly from both the escalating commodity prices and "Chinese flows of inexpensive goods, tourists and educational buyers."

"The wider Asia region, not least Southeast Asia, will gain from the cross-flow when continental economies do well. Having Canberra engaged diplomatically in Asia-Pacific affairs as a result is not a bad thing," the editorial said.

Source: Xinhua