THE Pacific is entering a period of unprecedented strategic pressure as geopolitical competition, crime and climate threats converge across the region.
Pacific Fusion Centre director Viliame Bovoro warned that Pacific countries would need to carefully manage their partnerships with external powers to protect their interests over the next five years.
Mr Bovoro said the three trends were already reinforcing each other in ways that would drive both threats and the behaviour of external actors.
“We are seeing the increasing presence of strategic assets into the region.
“We are seeing the increasing presence of transnational criminal activities.
“And we are seeing the increasing presence of political influence-mongering. If you overlay that over climate change and all the other issues – these are the things that are going to drive specific risks and responses, and shape the way outside powers come into the region to interact with us,” Mr Bovoro said.
He called for the Pacific Peace and Security Dialogue to grow into a permanent regional security forum along the lines of Asia’s prestigious Shangri-La Dialogue and argued that key external partners including the US and China needed to be at the table.
“Asia has something called the Shangri-La Dialogue. I think this is something that could potentially grow to become that.
“We need to bring in our partners from outside the region – the US, China because we are not in isolation here.
“We are part of the broader global frame, and all the parties that need to be in this room should be present.”
Mr Bovoro also issued a pointed call for accountability, warning that the Pacific’s repeated declarations of solidarity needed to be matched by verifiable action at both the national and regional level.
“It’s about not only keeping external partners to account, but also keeping ourselves accountable to the promises we make.
“What we say regionally needs to be reflected in what we are doing at the national level and we need to be accountable to our people for that.”
