As the federal government faces renewed pressure over its asylum seeker policy following riots and breakouts at the Christmas Island Detention Centre, Australia faces an uphill battle to win over regional neighbours at a crucial summit on people smuggling.
The Bali Forum begins in Denpasar on Tuesday.
A number of countries have expressed support for an agreed solution, but the response to a proposal to build an off-shore asylum processing hub in East Timor has been muted.
The East Timorese opposition says any processing centre on its land needs to be voted on by the people.
And Malaysia says the federal government's proposed asylum processing centre in East Timor is a matter for all the countries in the region to consider when they meet in Bali.
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On a recent visit to Australia, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak gave it lukewarm support for the idea at best.
"With respect to the processing centre, this is a regional initiative. And I believe this will be discussed in Bali, [but] we need a bit of time to study the Australian proposal," he said. "We will be as positive as we can. We have to take a regional outlook first and we will be as cooperative as possible."
The Bali Process, an agreement that came out of a 2002 conference on human trafficking, calls for greater cooperation between Indonesia and Australia to combat human smuggling, including intelligence sharing and using law enforcement to pursue smuggling networks.
More than 50 countries and international agencies will develop policies on people smuggling at the forum.
Foreign Affairs Minister Kevin Rudd and Immigration Minister Chris Bowen are attending the meeting.
Mr Bowen says he's optimistic that this week's meetings will take the idea of a regional processing centre further, although he concedes there's unlikely to be a concrete decision any time soon.
"We will be asking for some progress towards a framework that deals with those issues that you correctly identify, including people smuggling issues, penalties, and bilateral cooperation within a broader framework. Now, this is a complex area but this is a very important meeting. The Bali meeting has a lot of respect amongst our colleagues. A lot of Asian-Pacific nations.
Mr Bowen denies that the recent violent uprisings in the Christmas Island detention centre will further weaken support for the idea.
He says he believes governments in South East Asia and East Timor will keep an open mind, but says the Bali meeting is just one more step in the process.
"Of course it's controversial in East Timor. We will be arguing in Bali for a regional framework but the Bali meeting is not a forum for deciding any locations for those discussions. They remain a matter for bilateral discussions," he said.
The constant flow of asylum-seeker boats became one of three political problems the prime minister sought to defuse before the last federal election, along with the mining tax and the back-down on the emissions trading scheme.
