SYDNEY – Taiwan will attend an annual gathering of Pacific Island leaders in Palau in August, the regional bloc said, overcoming protests from China that saw Taipei barred from the event in 2025.
China and Taiwan were important partners to the region, a Pacific Islands Forum official told reporters late on Aug 7, after ministers from 18 member states met in Fiji to thrash out priorities.
“Taiwan is a very important development partner. It is not a dialogue partner. However, it engages with members of our forum family,” Baron Waqa, the forum’s secretary-general, told a news conference.
Palau, host of the Aug 30 to Sept 4 meeting, as well as Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands, are among Taiwan’s 12 remaining diplomatic partners.
China claims Taiwan is part of its territory and opposes the self-governed island’s participation in international organisations and exchanges with other countries.
Forum members Nauru, Kiribati and Solomon Islands have all switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to Beijing since 2019.
Solomon Islands, the host of 2025’s leaders meeting, blocked Taiwan from attending, resulting in all external countries being disinvited to the meeting, despite the island states’ reliance on foreign aid and investment.
“This year, it is an open invitation,” said Rick Hou, foreign minister in the Solomon Islands government that took office in May and has swiftly repaired ties with the United States, Japan and Australia.
A joint statement condemning China’s test of an intercontinental ballistic missile in the Pacific in July was still being negotiated, Waqa said, confirming that Nauru and Kiribati had held different positions to other forum members.
New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters on Aug 7 accused two states he did not name of appeasing “outsiders”, after the meeting failed to agree to the statement.
“Everyone wants that statement out,” Waqa later told reporters, adding that the arguments centred on whether it would focus solely on the Chinese missile test, or all missile testing in the Pacific.
The United States conducts ballistic missile tests in the northern Pacific under a defence agreement with the Marshall Islands.
The Pacific Islands also agreed step up efforts to invite world leaders to come to an October special United Nations climate change event in Tuvalu, which is at risk of being submerged by rising seas. AFP
