As Pacific leaders continue to ask Australia and New Zealand for visa-free travel between Pacific Island forum member countries, the Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong is aware of the representation and views of Pacific Island leaders, but stated that currently it has visa-free travel arrangements only with its Tasman neighbour, New Zealand.
She said the Australian government has heard the views of Pacific Island leaders and said that the reduction of visa application processing time was a good start.
According to Ms Wong, the Australian government has reduced the processing times and logistic barriers for Australian visa applications.
She said previously visa processing used to take up to 36 days, but that has been reduced to eight days.
“So, I’m really pleased that we managed to reduce our processing time for Fijians visiting Australia and that’s been as a result of responding to representations and the views of the Pacific,” she said.
