This article was first published by RNZ
New Zealand Foreign Minister says Pacific Islands Forum members may have opted to hold this week’s leaders’ meeting in another country if they had known the Solomon Islands was banning outside partners.
The annual meeting, scheduled to begin in Honiara on Monday, comes at a time of increased tension among members due to the ban on external partners of the PIF.
Winston Peters has spoken out repeatedly about “outsiders” influencing the Solomon Islands Prime Minister Jeremiah Manele to implement it.
This week, he doubled down on his previous comments and told Pacific Waves that the host nation was to blame for any disharmony in the Forum.
“The blame lies squarely with the decision by the Solomon Islands government, who knew that over the years and decades, we’ve invited dialogue partners to come along because it expands our capacity, and… for the first time… they’ve said they don’t want to invite anyone,” he said.
“Had we known that, the question is whether we’d be having it in Honiara next week, or in some other country where we can get dialogue partners to be interested. We need their help.”
Peters also stopped short of identifying which nations or leaders he believed were influencing the Solomon Islands and Manele.
“I don’t want to point to specific countries because it gets into a slanging match of no value to the Pacific Forum outcomes.”
Palau President Surangel Whipps Jr has also weighed in on the issue. When news emerged that Taiwan’s access to the leaders’ summit may be withdrawn, he suggested Solomon Islands consider giving up its position as host.
Following confirmation all partners would be banned - including the US and China - Whipps Jnr said he supported the move.
In a separate interview, Manele rejected Peters’ comments and said the partner ban was consistent with what was decided at last year’s leaders’ summit in Tonga regarding the official partners’ meeting, which is traditionally held after the big leaders’ meeting.
“[It is] not actually our decision to defer the post-Forum dialogue partners meeting. It is based on a decision made by leaders in Tonga last year that says that the new, enhanced mechanism for post-Forum dialogue should be ready before the Honiara leaders Forum meeting.
“Unfortunately, that new mechanism is not ready. So on that basis, my government, in consultation with the Forum Secretariat, has decided to defer the Forum dialogue segment of this year’s Forum leaders’ meeting.”
Manele also said speculation that non-forum countries would have representatives in Honiara despite the ban was untrue.
Massey University associate professor Anna Powles believed countries with diplomatic missions in Solomon Islands like China, Japan, the UK and the US would be holding meetings on the sidelines of the official programme.
Manele said he did not expect any partners’ to be holding meetings over the week.
“We hope that they do respect the decision that we have made.”
Manele also said all Pacific leaders were due to attend this week, apart from Sāmoa which would be represented by at the senior official-level because it had just finished its general elections.
By RNZ
