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In separate agreements with Nauru, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, Australia is attempting to edge out China’s influence in the region.
By Victoria Kim
Reporting from Sydney, Australia
A bank. A rugby team. A police force.
Within 12 days – and in time for Christmas – Australia unveiled a series of agreements with Pacific island countries to distribute what the countries could have put on the most sensible of their wish lists. The deals appear to be the culmination of months of behind-the-scenes diplomatic efforts aimed at limiting China’s growing influence in a strategically important hall in the Pacific Ocean.
On Friday, Australia announced the latest deal, a A$190 million ($118 million) deal for the Solomon Islands to increase its police force over four years.
The Solomon Islands has been a focal point of heated competition between China and the United States and its allies. In 2022, the nation of 700,000 reached a secret security pact that appeared to grant broad leeway to Beijing to exert influence and use the islands as a stopover for military operations.
Signed after an era of violent unrest rocked the Solomon Islands in 2021, it allowed China to send armed police or military forces to help. The deal has sparked fear among officials in Canberra and Washington.
Since then, the Biden leadership has evidently introduced a diplomatic offensive in the Pacific, opening embassies, promising investment and hosting leaders at a White House summit, while pushing Australia to exert its influence in the region.
But Chinese police education officials are already providing education in the Solomon Islands. The Australian deal announced on Friday does not appear to imply any commitment by the Solomon Islands to replace existing agreements with China or prevent them from entering into long-term deals.
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