Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said Thursday that short-term difficulties in the country's relationship with China won't affect long-term trade between the two.

"We have a number of difficulties in the relationship with China," Smith said on the sidelines of an industry conference.

The problems include the detention in China of Rio Tinto Ltd. (RTP) executive and Australian citizen Stern Hu, Smith said.

"But the long-term beneficial nature of the relationship both to China and Australia will in the end prevail over any of the difficulties."

"We need to take a long-term view of our relationship and we need to be patient," Smith said.

Australian officials continue to make representations to Chinese authorities that Hu's case should be dealt with "expeditiously," he said.

Australian consular officials will be allowed to visit Hu at the "start of next month," under a pre-existing agreement between the two countries that allows prisoner visits every 30 days, Smith said.

Hu, the head of Rio Tinto's iron ore marketing unit in China, was arrested in Shanghai in July and faces charges of bribery and infringing on trade secrets.

Smith's comments came a day after the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China stated in its annual position paper that its member firms remain concerned about the opaque manner in which the government is handling the Rio Tinto investigation.

Jiang Yu, spokeswoman for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said Thursday that China will deal with the Rio Tinto case according to Chinese law and a China-Australia consular agreement.

She said China's actions are "to safeguard the rule of law and create a sound and fair commercial environment, which is in the long-term interest of foreign companies in China."

Jiang, who was speaking in response to a reporter's questions at a regular news briefing, reiterated that sound bilateral ties are in the fundamental interest of both China and Australia.

She said she hopes Australia can join China in efforts to safeguard overall bilateral cooperation by respecting and accommodating each other's major concerns and properly handling sensitive issues.

-By Stephen Bell, contributing to Dow Jones Newswires; 61-8-9244-4243; sgbell@bigpond.com

(J.R. Wu in Beijing contributed to this report.)