Anthony Albanese is travelling to Palau for a Pacific Islands Forum summit overshadowed by disputes over regional security, China’s growing influence and a series of last-minute absences among island leaders.
The Australian prime minister will arrive on Monday afternoon with Energy Minister Chris Bowen and Pacific Island Affairs Minister Pat Conroy for the meeting, which is intended to focus on climate change, food and fuel security, and transnational drug crime.
It will be Mr Albanese’s first official visit to Palau, one of Taiwan’s remaining diplomatic allies in a region where Beijing has been seeking to deepen its strategic and economic reach.
The summit was expected to offer a show of regional unity, but the absence of several heads of government has instead highlighted the political pressures facing the 18-member forum.
The prime ministers of Fiji, Vanuatu and Samoa, along with the president of Kiribati, are all due to miss the gathering for different reasons. Solomon Islands Prime Minister Matthew Wale, the outgoing forum chair, also withdrew after a political challenge to his leadership emerged at home, only three months after he took office.
Senior public servants are expected to represent most of the countries whose leaders will not attend.
Pacific Islands Forum faces security test
The meeting comes less than two months after China conducted a long-range ballistic missile test in the South Pacific, prompting criticism from Australia, New Zealand and several island governments.
The missile was launched from a Chinese submarine on July 6 with a dummy warhead. It flew across the Pacific and appeared to land in waters near Tuvalu’s exclusive economic zone.
Beijing described the launch as routine and said it complied with international law. Pacific governments, however, objected to the lack of warning and the decision to conduct such a test in a region with a long history of concern over nuclear weapons and military activity.
Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong said at the time that China had been told Canberra regarded the test as destabilising to the region. Mr Conroy has argued that the incident strengthened the case for closer regional security arrangements.
China’s position on Taiwan is also expected to form part of the wider diplomatic backdrop. Palau, along with the Marshall Islands and Tuvalu, maintains formal relations with Taipei rather than Beijing, making the host country a particularly sensitive venue for discussions about strategic influence in the Pacific.
Australia has spent recent months trying to reinforce its relationships with island governments. Canberra has signed a mutual defence treaty with Fiji, concluded a new strategic agreement with Vanuatu and continued negotiations on a comprehensive security treaty with the Solomon Islands.
Those efforts have taken place alongside broader investment in regional infrastructure. The Australian Government said earlier this month that every Pacific Islands Forum member had been connected to undersea telecommunications cables, following the delivery of more than 10,300 kilometres of new cable infrastructure.
Climate diplomacy will remain a central part of the talks. Palau is due to host a special climate event alongside the forum, while Australia and Pacific partners prepare for pre-COP negotiations in Fiji and a leaders’ meeting in Tuvalu later this year.
The summit is also expected to mark the next stage of the Pacific Resilience Facility, a regional financing mechanism for climate adaptation, disaster preparedness and loss and damage. Australia and Fiji ratified the treaty in May, clearing the way for an initial call for project proposals at the Palau meeting.
In a statement issued before his departure, Mr Albanese said Australia’s role in the forum mattered “more than ever before”.
“The big challenges facing the Pacific require solutions designed and delivered for the Pacific, by the Pacific,” he said. “And Australia has a key role to play – as a partner and leader.”
He added that Australia was a “proud member of the Pacific family” and that investment in the security and prosperity of its neighbours would make the region safer and the Australian economy stronger.
