US, China barred from attending top Pacific political forum
By Kirsty Needham
Solomon Islands Prime Minister Jeremiah Manele has said that 21 donor countries – including the United States and China – would not be invited to the Pacific region’s top political meeting, a move that follows pressure from Beijing to exclude Taiwan.
China’s biggest security ally in the Pacific Islands, Solomon Islands is hosting the annual meeting of the 18-member bloc’s forum in September.
Solomon Islands Prime Minister Jeremiah Manele and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in Canberra last year.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Three Pacific island states have diplomatic ties with Taiwan and not China, and they had expressed concern Taiwanese officials would be blocked from entering the country. Solomon Islands switched ties from Taiwan to China in 2019, and in April removed Taiwan from a list of countries eligible for concessional entry.
Beijing, which has deepened its ties in the Pacific, claims Taiwan as its own territory.
Manele told the Solomon Islands parliament during the week that his cabinet had decided no dialogue partners would be invited to this year’s event because a review of each country’s relationship with the Pacific hadn’t been completed.
He said he had informed the forum’s 18 leaders of the decision this week.
The World Bank, Asia Development Bank and civil society groups would attend, he added.
A US State Department spokesperson said the US was “disappointed by reports that Solomon Islands has decided to exclude dialogue and development partners from the PIF Leaders Meeting this year,” referring to the Pacific Island Forum.
“We support the continued attendance of all PIF partners, including Taiwan, at the annual PIF Leaders Meeting, as previously agreed by PIF leaders in 1992.”
Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has urged the PIF to “maintain its existing arrangements” and allow for its participation as a “development partner”, Taiwanese news agency CNA reported. Taiwan in the past has attended the PIF informally to participate in side events, but it has not taken part in the main leaders’ meetings.
China’s embassy did not respond to a request for comment.
Solomon Islands opposition party politician Peter Kenilorea Jr, the chairman of the parliament’s foreign relations committee, said the prime minister’s decision was “a massive missed opportunity” for Pacific Islands countries to meet global donors.
“We know this issue is all about China and Taiwan,” Kenilorea told parliament.
Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine.Credit: AP
After forum leaders were told of the decision, Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine criticised interference in the forum’s affairs in a speech to her country’s parliament.
China had “interfered” at last year’s meeting in Tonga to change the language of the leaders’ communique, Heine said. References to Taiwan were removed after Chinese diplomats complained.
The Pacific Islands is among the world’s most aid-reliant regions, and on the front line of rising sea levels. The region has also been a focus of increasing security competition between the United States and China.
While US allies Australia and New Zealand are the largest forum members, neither Beijing nor Washington are part of the group.
Kenilorea said he feared that China, which has a strong presence in Solomon Islands, would hold bilateral meetings with Pacific leaders on the margins of the forum regardless.
“This could be seen by some PIF leaders as a betrayal of the collective and could risk an even bigger rift of the group,” he told Reuters.
The forum’s foreign ministers will meet in Fiji next week.
Reuters
Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for our weekly What in the World newsletter.