Papua New Guinea signs defense agreement with US
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken signed a defense cooperation agreement with Papua New Guinea on Monday, which he said would expand the Pacific island nation’s capabilities and make it easier for the US military to train with its forces.
Blinken was also set to meet 14 other Pacific island leaders. India’s Prime Minister Narendra
Modi had earlier pledged support for the Pacific Islands at a summit in the capital, Port Moresby.
The United States and its allies are seeking to deter Pacific island nations from forming security ties with China, a rising concern amid tension over Taiwan.
Leaders of the Pacific islands, whose territories span 40 million sq. km. (15 million sq, mi.) of ocean, have said rising sea levels caused by climate change are their most pressing security priority.
Meeting PNG Prime Minister James Marape, Blinken said the United States would deepen its partnership across the board with PNG. They discussed economic development, the climate crisis, and the importance of continuing US engagement with the Pacific, the US State Department said.
“The defense cooperation was drafted by the United States and Papua New Guinea as equals and sovereign partners,” Blinken said at a signing ceremony.
It will expand PNG defense capabilities to enhance humanitarian assistance and disaster response, and make it easy for United States and PNG forces to train together, Blinken said.
“It will be fully transparent,” he added.
China’s Foreign Ministry said it had no objection to normal exchanges and equal and mutually beneficial cooperation between relevant parties and Pacific island countries such as PNG, but cautioned against “geopolitical games.”
“What we need to be vigilant about is engaging in geopolitical games in the name of cooperation, and we also believe that no cooperation should target any third parties,” ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told a news briefing.
The United States and PNG struck a separate agreement on increasing maritime surveillance of PNG’s exclusive economic zone through US Coast Guard patrols, protecting its economy from illegal fishing.
Blinken said partnerships with businesses would bring tens of billions of dollars’ worth of new investment to PNG.
US President Joe Biden sent “his regret that he was not able to be here,” he added. Biden was forced to cancel his travel to PNG amid debt ceiling negotiations in Washington.
Marape said the agreement would boost economic security by giving PNG’s defense force “the ability to know what is happening in its waters – something we have never had since 1975.”
(Reuters)