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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.
Dec. 20, 2024Updated 11:01 a.m. ET
A bank. A rugby team. A larger police force.
Over the span of 12 days — and in time for Christmas — Australia has unveiled a string of deals with Pacific Island nations to dole out what those countries may have put on the top of their wish lists. The agreements appeared to be the culmination of months of behind-the-scenes diplomatic efforts aimed at curbing China’s growing influence in a strategically vital corridor of the Pacific Ocean.
On Friday, Australia announced the latest agreement, a 190 million Australian dollar ($118 million) deal designed to help the Solomon Islands expand its police force over a four-year period.
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 a period of violent unrest that rocked the Solomon Islands in 2021, it allowed China to send armed police officers or military forces to assist in maintaining order. The deal raised alarms among officials in Canberra and Washington.
Since then, the Biden administration has made a clear diplomatic push into the Pacific, opening embassies, pledging investments and hosting leaders at a summit at the White House while nudging Australia to build up its influence in the region.
But Chinese police training officials are already in the Solomon Islands. The Australian deal announced on Friday did not appear to contain commitments from the Solomons to alter existing pacts with China or to preclude it from entering into future ones.
