Pacific civil society – Asia Pacific Report

Pacific Islands Forum leaders in Koror – heavy on reaffirming but light on tasking

APR editor — Fri, 11 Sep 2026 00:03:10 +0000

With a Chinese ballistic missile test in July as prelude, the familiar China-Taiwan tensions and preparations for the Pacific pre-COP in October and COP31 the following month, the annual Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting (PIFLM) returned to Palau last week for the first time in 12 years, and north of the equator for the first time since Pohnpei in 2016.

Preparations for the 55th PIFLM were still underway as delegates arrived in Koror. An expected 2000 people soon choked the town as motorcades shuttled VIPs between hotels and venues.

Attendance speculation dominated the early part of the week. The leaders of Fiji, Kiribati, New Caledonia, Samoa and Vanuatu were absent, and barely anyone mentioned that New Zealand’s Christopher Luxon, chair from 2027, only planned to attend the retreat.

Kiribati, close to Beijing, sent the Director of Foreign Service and former ambassador to China, David Teaabo, but he was not in the room for the retreat, where the missile response was thrashed out, and Kiribati was initially omitted from acknowledgements at the closing session, which Teaabo called “protocol-wise … not good”.

Matthew Wale, Prime Minister of Solomon Islands and outgoing PIF chair, added to the drama: met on arrival on the evening of Saturday, August 29, by journalists asking about a no-confidence motion lodged in Honiara that day, he flew home in the early hours of Sunday. (The motion was withdrawn on September 7.)

Invited back were the Forum’s 21 dialogue partners, excluded from last year’s meeting in Honiara over China-Taiwan tensions, along with the sole “development partner”, Taiwan. At the opening ceremony, China’s envoy Qian Bo and Taiwan’s foreign minister Lin Chia-lung were seated in the same room.

The week culminated in the communiqué, 76 paragraphs under headings tracking the thematic areas of the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent. Leaders endorsed “revised Communiqué drafting procedures”, but the document is increasingly flabby and lacks forward momentum: “reaffirmed” appears 38 times and “endorsed” 20; “agreed” 14 times, twice only in principle; “tasked” once.

‘Partnership streams’
Leaders agreed on the placement of partners in the two “partnership streams” created by last year’s Leaders Policy on Partnerships, the communiqué’s only words on the subject. As the Secretariat explains it, Tier 1 “strategic partners” keep leader-level access, while Tier 2 “sectoral partners” engage only at ministerial level on specific issues, with placements reviewed after a year.

Secretary General Baron Waqa will now write to the countries concerned. The communiqué does not name them, but the ABC and SBS report that the 13 strategic partners are China, the United States, Japan, France, India, Indonesia, Germany, the United Kingdom, the European Union, Canada, Singapore, South Korea and the United Arab Emirates.

That leaves in the second stream Türkiye, the host of COP31, and Thailand, whose prime minister is coming to the pre-COP, and six others. Their reactions will be watched closely.

The Belau Declaration for Urgent and Inclusive Climate Action to Keep 1.5°C Within Reach was issued the day after a sobering UNEP report confirmed that the target will be overshot, as the declaration itself concedes.

It restates the Pacific position more strongly for the pre-COP and COP31 but sets out no pathway for returning the issue to centre stage globally; that job is deferred to the leaders’ meeting in Tuvalu that sits alongside the pre-COP proper, which Fiji co-hosts.

After Australia failed to secure a Pacific COP31, the consolation prize of a pre-meeting had been sold as a chance for world leaders to see Pacific climate impacts firsthand.

Fiji’s foreign minister, Sakiasi Ditoka, revealed that the leaders of Antigua and Barbuda, Cabo Verde, Thailand, Maldives and Timor-Leste would come, along with a handful of ministers. Leaders do not usually attend pre-COPs, but the media presented the low turnout as a major embarrassment.

Australian sticking point
For some, Australia’s own contribution remains the sticking point. Vanuatu’s Climate Change Minister, Ralph Regenvanu, was typically forthright, telling the media that Australia was “not doing enough” and must end fossil fuel expansion.

He spoke on the day Australia’s new environmental regulator approved an extension of the BHP Mitsubishi Alliance’s Saraji coal mine to 2055, its first coal approval since it began operating on July 1, and by the Climate Council’s count the 37th fossil fuel project approved since Labor took office in 2022.

The Chinese missile, fired from a submarine, crossed the exclusive economic zones of several Forum members, including the Federated States of Micronesia, Naoero (formerly Nauru) and Kiribati, before coming down near the Kiribati-Tuvalu boundary.

Leaders “registered concern” and called for at least 24 hours’ notice of future tests from all states, presumably including the United States, though neither China nor the US is named.

But with Kiribati absent from the retreat and Naoero’s President, David Adeang, dissociating his country from the paragraph in a footnote, the consensus was undermined. Naoero, which switched recognition to Beijing in 2024, was the sole formal dissenter among the 18 members.

There was some movement on West Papua. Prodded by the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG), the PIF agreed to facilitate a dialogue with Indonesia and a mission of “interested Leaders”, destination unstated, in consultation with the MSG Secretariat, reporting back in 2027.

The Forum’s envoys, appointed in 2023, Fiji’s Sitiveni Rabuka and PNG’s James Marape, are to press Indonesia on the long-sought visit by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the invitation for which was originally extended by Indonesia in 2018 but still not granted.

Indonesia may face ‘review’
The MSG wants the visit by 31 December 2026, when Indonesia’s presidency of the UN Human Rights Council ends, or it will review Indonesia’s associate member status at its 2027 summit.

Leaders also approved terms of reference for a Renewable Energy Commissioner, first agreed in 2023, to sit within the Pacific Community (SPC) with dual reporting to SPC and the Forum Secretariat, funded by an initial A$1.89 million from Australia. Once appointed, the commissioner is to advocate for investment in renewables and coordinate the push towards 100 percent renewables, cutting dependence on imported diesel.

AI and digital sovereignty formally joined the regional agenda with the endorsement of the Pacific Digital and Artificial Intelligence Technology Principles, “the Pacific’s first collective regional position on artificial intelligence”, which will inform a governance framework in 2027.

The Pacific Pact on Gender and Climate Action is also new, committing governments to strengthen women’s representation in climate delegations, ministerial portfolios and governance bodies. Asked at the final press conference how that would happen with only one female leader among the Forum’s 18 members (Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine), after some confused looks, PIF chair Surangel Whipps said Palau was traditionally a matrilineal society where the women “decide who’s chief“, and predicted that “a new woman president is not far away”. (When Whipps invoked the influence of leaders’ wives, Luxon said, “That’s not the same, mate”.)

The closing press conference also exposed issues yet to reach the leaders’ agenda, none of them in the communiqué: a growing HIV crisis, which civil society groups complained was left off the health agenda; the future of Bougainville as it moves towards independence from Papua New Guinea; and the ambitions of Guam and American Samoa, associate members since 2024, for full membership despite their status as US territories.

The next PIFLM will be held in New Zealand in 2027, and the one after that in Naoero, the missile-testing dissenter, followed by Marshall Islands in 2029, Vanuatu in 2030 and French Polynesia in 2031.

Whether the intervening 12 months produce action on the commitments made in Koror, or another communiqué heavy on reaffirming and light on tasking, remains to be seen.

Dr Tess Newton Cain is an Associate of the Development Policy Centre and an adjunct Associate Professor at the Griffith Asia Institute. Stefan Armbruster is an award-winning journalist with 30+ years experience covering Australia and the Pacific. Formerly head of news (Pacific) at RFA/BenarNews and SBS correspondent; previously with BBC, ABC, Dow Jones and CNBC. This article is republished from ANU’s Development Policy Blog under Creative Commons.

Has the Pacific’s Ocean of Peace concept been hijacked?

APR editor — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 00:34:24 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Johnny Blades of RNZ Pacific

As geopolitical tensions increase in the Pacific region and numerous security alliances are rapidly forged, questions are being raised over whether the Ocean of Peace concept is being hijacked.

The Ocean of Peace Declaration was made last year by members of the Pacific Islands Forum, recognising the role of civil society in peacebuilding.

However, the emphasis of the initiative seems to have quickly shifted.

Australia and Fiji take the lead
Australia last week signed the Vuvale Union and Ocean of Peace Alliance treaties with Fiji, the latest in a series of regional pacts Canberra has forged with Pacific Islands countries.

“The Vuvale Union and the Ocean of Peace Alliance have a really strong regional component,” Australia’s High Commissioner in Suva, Peter Roberts said in a post on X.

He said the new treaties underlined Fiji’s position as a regional leader.

“I think we’ve all seen during this fuel crisis how important Fiji is as a hub. And we’ve seen on security matters how important Fiji is as a regional leader, including through Prime Minister Rabuka’s vision for the Ocean of Peace.”

According to Roberts, the treaties empower Australia and Fiji to support the Pacific region in efforts against security threats such as transnational crime, cyber crime and illegal fishing.

“Including in this Fiji and Australia supporting the establishment of the Ocean of Peace Centre, in close cooperation with the Pacific islands Forum. So you’ll see Australia and Fiji standing together in support of the stability and prosperity of the region.”

Value for money
The Vuvale Union is backed by around A$1 billion in funding for Fiji by Australia over a decade, while Australia is also funding the Ocean of Peace Centre to the tune of around A$22 million.

Geopolitical commentator Dr Connor Graham from the Lowy Institute said Australia sees great value for money in these arrangements.

He said Australia was driven by the aim of keeping China out of Pacific waters and maintaining its position as the dominant security partner in the region.

“I’d note as well, a billion dollars over 10 years is a lot of money. But it’s relatively small fries in terms of defence, and the rest of the defence budget and militarisation. So I think this sort of defence through diplomacy is quite a cost effective use of money.”

While Canberra notches a big diplomatic win, regional civil society has been left wondering where it all leaves the Ocean of Peace Declaration.

Shift away from peacebuilding?
The declaration came together off the back of significant engagement with — and made provision for the leadership of — Pacific civil society in peacebuilding, especially women and Indigenous communities.

“This meaningful inclusion was celebrated and consultation followed on the premise of institutional support for conflict prevention and mediation initiatives grounded in culture, like those that were so successful with the Bougainville conflict, or in bringing Kiribati back into the Forum,” Pacific historian and AUT lecturer Dr Marco de Jong said.

But now, with the signing of the Ocean of Peace Alliance and plans to establish the Centre, the language has shifted from being about conflict prevention, peacebuidling and mediation towards deterrence, and the countering of China through military means.

It coincides with the plan of the Australian-led Joint Heads of Pacific Security to insert itself into the Pacific Islands Forum-led regional security architecture, and to advance a regional deployment framework

Joey Tau, the coordinator of the Pacific Network on Globalisation and the chair of the Pacific Regional NGO Organisations Alliance, said that as civil society, they welcomed the original Ocean of Peace initiative

“But our main concern is that we hope such a declaration is not coopted or used as a strategy to advance external security and military interest of external parties.”

He said the Ocean of Peace concept should be something that draws from existing regional priorities and responds to legacy issues for the Pacific.

These include self-determination problems in West Papua and Kanaky New Caledonia; the planetary biodiversity crisis; exploitation of ocean resources; nuclear testing and new threats of nuclearisation in the region.

“One, the Rarotonga Treaty, which declares our region is a nuclear-free region, and secondly, other initiatives as such, need to be informed by the Pacific. And when I say Pacific, Pacific peoples.

“With the proposal of a peace institute, I think it needs further consultation. It needs to be informed by Pacific people, and one that is not determined by external parties.”

Women and peacebuilding
Pacific Women Mediators Network coordinator of political engagement Sharon Bhagwan-Rolls is concerned about the lack of focus on peacebuilding in how the Ocean of Peace initiative is being developed.

“For us, demilitarisation is at the top of the agenda,” she told RNZ Pacific.

“You can’t talk about peace with simply saying that it is the absence of violence or conflict. We have to talk about peacebuilding in the operationalisation of the Ocean of Peace Declaration, and that has been clear for us from the start.”

She said it was important not to see peace building as simply a regional security agenda.

“It is critical that the future or the operationalisation of the Ocean of Peace Declaration through the Pacific Islands Forum needs a stronger focus on peace building in practice, not simply from seeing peace through a traditional security or militarised lens, but through a civilian lens, through a civil society lens, through a people-centered lens.”

“It’s important that we don’t just see peacebuilding as simply a regional security agenda,” Bhagwan-Rolls said.

“We feel that there is a need in forging alliances to also support the forging of peace-building alliances and not just security alliances, and that peace cannot just simply stand as a word of inaction, but we talk about transformative peace.”

As far as the Ocean of Peace Centre is concerned, Dr de Jong said its ultimate purpose had not been made clear, leading to speculation within regional civil society.

“Certainly, regional civil society asked for a peace centre, but maybe they got a military base instead,” he said.

“This has, in effect, shifted the focus of the Declaration itself towards deterrence, and the countering of China through military means.”

Things are moving fast
Regional civil society is also concerned that the Ocean of Peace initiative is being dominated by Australia and Fiji — not necessarily with Pacific regional buy-in

Tau said that to declare something as regional required wider consultation, not just an agreement between two countries.

“Anything of a peace regional peace institute or anything further along those lines needs proper consultation,” he told RNZ Pacific.

“So I must caution: what stems from a bilateral agreement should not very much impact the regional steps. We have to caution ourselves around that, it calls for wider consultation, and I think that that is the proper process of informing policy.”

Bhagwan-Rolls said they would continue as a civil society peace building network, and as a feminist peacebuilding network, to bring attention to the priority issues from their members and communities right across twenty Pacific Island countries and non-independent states.

She called on the foreign ministers of the Pacific Islands Forum to ensure things don’t move too hastily and that substantive consultation with civil society peacebuilders takes place.

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