 Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Gordon Peek. I'm the Senior Advisor for the Pacific Islands at the United States Institute of Peace, and I'm delighted to welcome you to a webcast event on examining regional security in the Pacific Islands. So good afternoon if you're in Washington, D.C. Good morning from Thursday morning if you're on the other side of the dateline in the Pacific Islands. I want to begin before I hand it over to a real all-star panel that we have by sort of trying to sort of lay the table and make some framing remarks, which is in the last year the United States has been paying more attention to the Pacific Islands, including by rolling out its first ever Pacific Island strategy in 2022. And just this earlier on this week, President Biden welcomed leaders from the Pacific Island Forum countries to the White House the second time in two years. I did some research prior to this, and it was at earlier the administration of George H.W. Bush that was the last time the Pacific leaders had been as regular visitors in the White House. Indeed, as someone in the Pacific Islands told us a few months ago when we were traveling there, it sometimes feels like this is the first time since the Second World War that the United States has been paying as much attention to the Pacific Islands. And in that war, the Pacific was a theater for great power competition, and it's tempting to transplant that lens to what is happening today. But the big difference, of course, is that what were then shattles or colonies of the great powers are now proudly independent nations themselves. And as one of our guests, Maureen Penduelle, observed, if it's about us, this conversation, it must be with us. And so we're lucky to get today to be joined by four people who've got great experience writing, thinking, and advocating about the facets of the Pacific Islands. And we also got a great geographic spread. So from sort of going from sort of north to south, we have Kenneth Cooper from Guam, we have Tecua Yuta from Kiribati, and to my left here we have Tarsisius Cabotakala from Solomon Islands, not based in Hawaii, and Maureen from Fiji. And what we want to do in this conversation is to give our guests sort of five to seven minutes to ask them sort of provide some framing observations. And then what we'll do is we'll open it up to conversation. We're also speaking on the USIP YouTube channel, and we encourage anyone who's listening online to feed in their questions to us. And we'll try to address as many of those questions as possible. So I want to begin with Tecua from Kiribati, a place that is getting more and more attention is often framed in terms of great power competition between the United States and China. But yet as you were observing to us on the walk down to this event, often the security needs at an everyday level in Kiribati are very, very different from sometimes the preoccupations of people that are in capitals far away. Thank you very much. Gordon, good afternoon. It's a pleasure to be on this very important panel discussing this important topic. Like I was saying to you, Gordon and to the others, I used to work with government for 30 years or more, and then in the last five years I've been out working with the people. And my observation now that I'm outside of government is that the ordinary people on the street, their understanding of security issues are very, very different from what we understand at government and in our discussions with our development partners and now other countries from the Pacific. Climate change is impacting a lot on the lives of people. They are health issues because water is affected. The little food that we can provide is getting scarce. And so those are some of the issues that we face. But people are mostly interested or worried about how do they put food on the table. Just a few days ago, I think it was Monday, my government, my president, my government signed a threshold program with the United States through the Millennium Challenge Corporation. And the focus was on trying to improve the accessibility of our people to enter international labor markets. And that is mainly because we have a very young growing population and unemployment rate is very high and sustainable. So we want opportunities for our young people to go and find jobs abroad. So that is to us, to the ordinary people, it's a security threat. What if our young people don't have jobs? Who will put food on the table? What will happen to us when we get sick? Who will provide the medicine, the medication that we need? So it's very different from how security issues are perceived, I guess, from the side of the United States government authorities. We do have China. I think we are one of the last, the most recent Pacific Island country that had China come in. We switched from Taiwan back in 2019, I think, if I recall. And with the Chinese coming in, there's been a lot of visibility on what they do. Then the U.S. came, Japan came, they all wanted to establish embassies there. So there's been a growing interest now from our, traditionally we just had to work with Australia. And like what you mentioned a few minutes ago, that all was one of the very important and great battle sites in World War II, where a lot of the U.S. Marines lost their lives. But that's practically what we remember. So it's the older generation that has a memory of that. The younger generation don't really know about the U.S. And so now that things are beginning to become, there's more interest in our country, I'm talking now more from the national perspective. What we want is very different from what probably the Americans and the Chinese are interested in. We want development so that we can achieve our aspirations, economic aspirations. And so to many of the people on the streets, when we talk about military security and thinking, they say, what's going on? They say, though the Chinese are not good, because there might be a potential conflict with the U.S. and the other traditional allies like Australia, the power setup. And they say, what's going to happen? Why are they going to be interested in bombing or dropping missiles on us? We don't really have much. What we are interested in is how do, like I said, how do we put food on the table? So security issues in Kiribati is very different. The understanding of the people on the streets is totally different from what people in the government might have and people from outside the country also have. So that's basically my opinion. That's great. And I think it's a really good way to open it and also these almost different ways of seeing the world that there is. And where you sit, where you stand, or where you sit depends on what you see, as well. So just to turn to Kenneth as well, who's sort of up in Guam and up sort of adjacent to the freely associated states of Micronesia and to the freely associated states of sort of federated states of Micronesia, Marshall Islands and Palau and Guam itself, which has its own unique position within the United States. It'd be great to get your perspective on issues as well, because Guam has gone, I think, from being a little bit like Kiribati in a way, something that was maybe not mentioned that much to being something that's ever more frequently a kind of beat in conversations about Pacific security. It's one of the biggest US bases. It is the biggest US base in the region. So great to get your thoughts on that. Sure. How are you, everyone? I'm Ken, glad to be here. I think when it comes to Guam, there's something that I notice about the freely associated states, Guam, the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands, which are right to the north of us, is we live at the intersection of human security challenges and traditional security challenges. And I think that's something that we have to face. There's that term charm offensive that's being used all over the media in regards to what the US engagement in the Pacific. But in fact, if you look at Micronesia, it's not just charm, it's military. And so while there are human security challenges, the geopolitical doesn't go away for us in the American affiliated Micronesia. And so I think that the largest problem is when the US military becomes perceived vehicle to solve both traditional security challenges and human security challenges, because then it doesn't allow much diversification about what the US military's role is in our sort of sub region of Oceania. And that becomes there's a caution to that, because when we start viewing the United States military as the deliverer of goods, both from a traditional security and a human security perspective, well, it becomes a lot easier for the US military to engage in its own agenda. Now, there are partnerships that we could have with the US military, but what we've seen in Guam is that, well, Guam is a modern day colony of the United States. We convince no words about that. And so from our perspective, geopolitics in Guam, we're sort of forced into the framework of seeing it as seeing China as a persistent everyday threat, right? We're put into that mind. The reason why we have to build 360 degree missile defense of Guam, the reason why we have to put radar systems in Palau is because of what's going on with China. And so our whole sort of a lot of times I wish we had sort of where everyday politics is almost divorced from geopolitics, but it doesn't operate like that in Guam. Neither does it in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, where the governor is now shifting tourism away from the People's Republic of China and more going towards US military affiliated tourism, right? And so that's the framework that we operate in, in our part of Micronesia. And so when I think about regional security, I always think is there an escape, right? Is there a way out of sort of having a militarized form of, well, what should be diplomacy, a militarized form of what should be aid, a militarized form of our connections and our relationship with the United States? Is there a way out of that? Or as Robert Rogers said, who was a historian who wrote one of the most canonical Guam textbooks, even though it is problematic in many ways, Destiny's Landfall, is that our, are we destined for this? Is this, are we just a pawn in the realpolitik of great geopolitical powers? And I think often I find myself wondering what an alternative future looks like for our sort of part of Micronesia that doesn't get put into the geopolitical logics of now US-China frame. What comes next? And I'll give you an example of this. We went to sort of the comments from the Missile Defense Agency, they had a scoping period in Guam. And they, we asked, what if there wasn't China and the officer point blank looks at us and goes, well, it'll be good for the next threat. So is that the way that we have to think about our usage of Guam and our part of Micronesia, always preparing for the next threat? Are we the place if security is sort of protecting threats to your most cherished values? And if we look at security as having three components, number one, that which is threatened, right, the response, the threat and the response to the threat, a lot of times Guam and Micronesia, we aren't the thing to be protected in my estimation, we are part of the response repertoire to protect the United States. And so our security is often not, how should I put this differently? I don't think it is true that what is good for the United States security is necessarily good for Guam. I don't think and I don't believe that United, what's good for United States security is necessarily to use Reagan language trickle down to Guam. I think there are moments in time when it's more zero sum that what is good for the United States security often comes at the price of Guam and other parts of Micronesia. I'm not saying that it has to be the case all the time, but when those moments do occur, we in Guam, we in the freely, you know, you know, in this part of the region, I'm not from the freely associated states, don't pretend to speak for them, but at least we in Guam, we should address that because Guam security should come first. And we need to resolve the tensions and sort of the contradictions that happens when US military needs tend to be put first and prioritized over what is good for Guam security. And so I know that's a lot. I'll leave it there for that's terrific. It's funny that you say that about, you know, the next threat. I read a book about a couple of months ago was written by someone who's kind of slightly date me with a gentleman called Willard Price. And I remember him as a child, he wrote these sort of books about adventures and kind of different parts of the world. But he wrote this charming but disturbing book about his journeys in the Japanese Pacific that was then Micronesia, Marshall Islands, and in Guam. And he talks about how everyone in Guam the 1930s were talking about the threat of the Japanese. And it's an example of just as you were speaking about how this persistent the threat may change, but yet Guam's perceived role in that is the same. He goes and meets US military people and they said, oh, we're really worried about the Japanese. And I'm sure maybe if we went back in a time machine to the 1970s, 1980s, we were worried about the Soviet Union as well. So it's a good reminder of how the kind of ironies and the beats of history. I want to turn to Maureen from the Pacific network on globalization. Maureen, we're sort of meeting on Wednesday here. In the last couple of days, the White House summit has concluded with the Pacific Islands forum. There's been statements that have been released. I think we all watched the kind of opening remarks given by President Biden and by Prime Minister of Premier of Cook Islands. It'd be great to get your thoughts about what's in the statement, what's not in the statement, what's your reading of the situation from a Fijian perspective and from a regional perspective. Thank you, Gordon and Nisam Bulavinaka, everyone. I wanted to just really focus on President Biden's statement and in particular his last sets of words. And I want to just quote from it because I think it's quite useful to look at it and to tie what Gordon used to say in terms of framing, what the Ambassador said in terms of this mismatch, constant mismatch perceptions about what does security mean in the Pacific. He said this, like our four barriers during World War II, we know that a great deal of the history of our world will be written across the Pacific over the coming years. And like them, we owe it to the next generation to write that story together, to do the hard work together, historical work, right? And he quotes General MacArthur, for which a better world for all will come. He goes on to say that's the objective here of the U.S. Pacific Summit. So today let's recommit to that goal, let's recommit to each other because with the past as our proof, we are stronger and the world is safer when we stand together. And when you look at those final statements, it's quite stark in terms of the referencing particularly of World War II, the big narratives of the time around peace and security for all the Pacific theater of war. The statement really reflects, you see where the U.S. places its emphasis, which is on veterans and remnants of unexploded ordinance as its markers of history today, right? But for many of us in the Pacific today, that is not what we remember. What we really remember is a totally different peace, an era of peace, a time when the U.S. and its allies, particularly British and the France, tested nuclear weapons across the blue Pacific under and during imperial rule. I think that's a very important technology because the fact that it's not even referenced is clearly differentiating points of view about past history and what does it mean about moving forward together. A very good starting point would be for the U.S.-specific relationship would be to start with a public acknowledgement of this period, this very dark period that our people experience and continue to experience. Are people still demand for not just an acknowledgement but also an apology of this dark period, beyond remnants and veterans, unexploded ordinance and veterans. And I think it's really quite clear that if we look at the outcome statement, the fact that the negotiations for the final come back to free association with the Republic of the Marshall Island remains outstanding and that is quite a stark reminder of what a joint history and a joint future might look like. I want to be very clear that when we look at our histories today, obviously many of our countries are independent, but since 1985 our forebears from the Pacific have been sending very clear message to the world and that includes the U.S. and its allies that the South Pacific is a nuclear free zone. It's very critically important that people recognize that as a cornerstone in terms of security, particularly when you're talking about convention on traditional security across the region. In addition, during that time and insistently our countries are now having to see again this whole alignment, non-alignment movement and France to all enemies to none. That's the cornerstone of the Pacific's nuclear free zone. It runs counter to the U.S. and its allies in terms of conventional and the Pacific has been persistent since then to further through Boye plus declaration and obviously into the 2050 strategy to articulate what is a Pacific security narrative which today makes climate change the most critical security threat that the regions faced with and at the heart of that it's about locating human security of our people, not the expansion of U.S. military, industrial military within the Pacific. And I think the Rarotronga Treaty is always a good reminder to our partners when we're talking about security, although we do recognize that Australia in particular a very good friend of ours in the region have left the door partially open to allow for the movement of nuclear powered vessels across the Pacific. And through that it has enabled AUKUS to come into front and center around security, something which goes against many of our countries, independent countries, real wish at the time and still insistent today. And so I think that if we are indeed to work hard together, do these really historical work together, we need to see real proof from the United States. We need to see real evidence of what does that mean when these contradictions or differences in understanding of security beyond conventional security in our region. So when you look at the litmus test right now in terms of nuclear security, the Fukushima case is the case in point. The South Pacific Treaty really prohibits the dumping of radioactive nuclear waste in our part of the world. But the green lighting of the IAEA by the United States gave the Japanese government the go ahead to start dumping 1.3 million tons of radioactive wastewater over 30 to 40 years into the Pacific Ocean. We need proof that if we are indeed to be together, there has to be a demonstration of the U.S. on some of this more difficulties partially because the Fukushima radioactive wastewater dump will threaten the economic livelihood of many of our countries. The perception of nuclear contamination of fish fisheries, which is our economic lifeline, is a real threat of which the Japanese government and all the IAEA will take responsibility who will compensate the Pacific in the event of such a catastrophe. And it is a possibility, mere perception of contaminated fish from the Pacific. So I think that there is quite a lot of work that we need to see. And I think there's a real danger that particularly with the over promise around IAEA budget. We have the announcement from last year. A lot of people are looking at it to see that actually a lot of that hasn't come through in terms of real money coming through to the Pacific. So I think there's a real caution here about the promise, over promise of aid into the Pacific, particularly when you consider the context of debt. And many of our countries are debt stressed. They are looking to grant an aid as mere access to found infrastructure across the region. And so I think there's a real danger that we will put all of our eggs in the one basket that the U.S. will deliver on many of those promises. But I think it is just the beginning of a working relationship. As you said, it's been a very long time since the Pacific has come back into Washington. But perhaps our political leaders can try to leverage as much as they can. Because we are from the region, we are very clear about what the security mean. And we have cornerstone frameworks and agendas that would be good if our partners could learn to understand it and also to respect it. Thank you, Maureen. And for bringing up this really important issue of kind of the nuclear ghosts that are sort of in the in the in the Pacific. I mean, I'm thinking of that line. I think it's William Faulkner who said the past has not yet passed. You know, it may be passed for people here. And there's a number of people that are in the room that are a lot more qualified than I am to talk about the nuclear legacy in places like Marshall Islands, but also in Kiribati as well. And in the kind of French Pacific, too. And it's one of the things that really struck me about the sort of what you were saying is almost this sort of, we're all speaking the one language to each other English, but we're almost speaking in such different languages that we're not sort of hearing each other. So something we are sort of put as a question for you to think about when we talk about if time allows is how do you actually get these different conversations in the same route? How do you actually form structure a conversation so you're so that we're not actually saying, well, you're talking about militarization. I'm talking about human security. How do you actually meld it and kind of blend it, blend it together? So thank you. Thank you, Maureen. And last but not least, we have Tarsisius who must feel ever more popular being a sort of Solomon Islander and asked about your country as being ever more a kind of part of the kind of geopolitical sort of tip of the spear maybe in a way. Prime Minister of Solomon Islands and the Prime Minister of Vanuatu did not attend the summit, returned to Haniaara yesterday or today and sort of said, well, I'm not really wasn't really sure about it. I didn't think there's any value in it. Mentioned the issue that Maureen did about funding issues to think gets to another issue of confusion about the rule of Congress, which is such a different set up here to how Pacific Island countries work or even the United Kingdom where I'm from originally. So it'd be great to get your thoughts Tarsisius on Solomon Islands place in this kind of emerging sort of security space and about questions about the militarization and also about Te Coa's point about about how the human security issues are there to over to you. Thank you, Gordon, and good well afternoon. I was scared you would ask me about the Solomon Islands. I was hoping I wouldn't. But yes, the Prime Minister Solomon Islands mentioned on Radio Australia. Mentioned on Radio Australia yesterday that one of the reasons why he was reluctant to come to Washington D.C. was that the U.S. then not to deliver on the promises that it's made. And as you say, this is difficult because sometimes and that making this in comparison with China where a lot of the decisions can be centralized and therefore move quickly. Whereas here in the U.S., domestic politics and particularly the need to go through Congress sometimes makes things really difficult. But I'll come back to the Solomon Islands issue again later. There are a couple of things that I want to reiterate from the previous speakers. The first is that the most important security issue for Pacific Islanders is human development. And if our development partners from Australia and New Zealand or the U.S. can help Pacific Island countries address issues that are daily concerned for Pacific Islanders, then they would be able to address the bigger issues of geopolitical competition as well. And to a certain extent people see that as coming from China because they're visible, as the ambassador said, that they come in and do things that are quickly visible, although often not very sustainable and in the longer term could also create a lot of problems as well. And so thinking through the development issues with Pacific Island governments and Pacific people I think is fundamental to security in the Pacific Islands. That's the first point I want to make. The second is to reiterate something that Morin mentioned. The U.S. often references its relationship to the Pacific Islands vis-a-vis World War II. And it often makes me cringe because the narrative from the U.S. is often that World War II was a war of liberation, that the Pacific Islands were liberated particularly from Japan through World War II and therefore the U.S. was liberating power. But there is another side to that narrative as well. Second World War gave the U.S. the power to colonize certain parts of the Pacific and therefore use the Pacific as a site for things like nuclear testing. And that's not a positive narrative for the U.S. and therefore using the Second World War as a reference point for U.S.-Pacific Island relationship is old-fashioned and I think dangerous. And also on top of that, as Morin mentioned, places like Solomon Islands, World War II continues to kill our people through unexploded audiences. And therefore the memory of people today about World War II is a weapon that never ends, never stops killing. And so I think it's very important that U.S. leaders and U.S. public servants bear that in mind. So it's, and that moves me to another thing that I wanted to mention is that the post-Second World War period resulted in increasing militarization in the Pacific. And the concern about the current geopolitical competition is that we are already seeing an increasing militarization again. We see it through, you know, the increase in the deployment of Marines to places like Guahan or Guam. The talks about establishing relationships with Palau that would see, you know, some kind of U.S. military presence. Of course, the six nuclear capable B-62 bombers stationed in the Northern Territory in Australia, the Lombroom Naval Base in Papua New Guinea, AUKUS, and other things that are happening in the Pacific. The other point I want to make about increasing militarization is that in cases where we do not see physical military presence, there is a danger of an increasing militarization of Pacific Island police. And we've seen it in the case of places like Solomon Islands. Not only by Western countries, but by China as well, that a competition for having access to domestic security institutions such as the police could increase the militarization of those police, which for us raises a question. If we are to militarize our police, who is the enemy? And oftentimes, as we've seen in the Pacific context where we have military or we have an increased military police, we've used it domestically. Fiji is a classic example of the coups from 1987 up until 2006. In the case of Papua New Guinea, the Papua New Guinea Defense Force was used most in the case of Bougainville. So increasing militarization of domestic security institutions I think will backfire on the kinds of security issues that we have in the Pacific. Sorry, I kind of went away from the Solomon's thing. You did a very artful job of that. Do you want to talk a little bit about this sort of the Prime Minister's non-show, or should we try to open it up into a conversation and say the choice is yours? We'll come back to it. We'll come back to it. Okay, that's fine. The one thing that theme that I'm thinking about in my mind throughout this whole thing is just almost everyone speaking English in this conversation, but we're almost just speaking such different languages. You've got the language of human security at one level. You've got a language that is focused on legacy issues and broad human security at one level. And you've got a militarized language at one level. I guess the sort of question for you collectively is, and we also have so many forums presently whereby Pacific Island governments and the United States, but also other powers sort of get the opportunity to meet each other. So you've got the meeting that happened on Monday and Tuesday. You've got the Pacific Island's forum. You've got APEC for some Pacific Island nations. I'd love to get your thoughts about what's the best mechanism to kind of have these conversations? Because it sort of sounds like they're all dancing around each other, but no one's actually getting together in the room and having them out. Is there a forum that would be useful to have that? Because they all use the word security, but there's such diametrically different accents placed on the word security. Let me jump in and then others can, enough for me. And I know that not every Pacific Island places or not every Pacific Island is a member of the Pacific Island's forum. But for those who are members of the Pacific Island's forum, I think the 2050 Blue Pacific Strategy is a good place to begin. And because it's a collective document, it's a collective effort by Pacific Island forum countries. Of course, that then excludes places like Guam and looking for other avenues through which countries that are not member of the forum can be powered off. Yeah, and then maybe it gets into the, you and I are both from sort of an academic tradition of getting people to read what's already been written and said and kind of voiced already. Sometimes it's easier to kind of overlook it rather than to do that in the kind of boy declaration that talks a lot about frames issues in terms of kind of human security as well. I think the Pacific is really clear in terms of expanding the notions of security, as I said, from nuclear into climate into human security. And they've done it and all of our documents are referencing documents. I think the point of contention is that our development partners, there is a sense of amnesia that when we are talking about security or Pacific Islanders, we know precisely what security we're talking about. So I mean, it was good to see at least in this outcome statement the referencing to two very critical initiatives led by the Pacific on climate change, which is on maritime security, borders more specifically, and also the support for countries in the context of sea level wise and, you know, the possible disappearance of countries. So I think it takes a lot of effort to get partners to pay attention to the Pacific. But I think the litmus test for me always is how then will the U.S. in its commitment to climate security for Pacific Islanders, what does that mean beyond some of the kind of legal expertise and capacity building that they're offering? What more can the U.S. do to demonstrate the commitment in the climate arena and around climate security? But I think the burden constantly shifts to Pacific Islanders. We are constantly having to say and I'm always surprised at how much we have to say to development partners consistently. Our people want clean water, food on the table, access to jobs. That's security for us. But just have to go constantly at it. And I think there is something fundamental about all of our partnerships right now. Everyone talks about listening, deep listening. I've seen it in the Australian approach to the region and I've seen it in the U.S. statement. It's all about deep listening. But really, is there deep listening when we still have this cemetery? I guess it's the difference between listening and hearing or hearing and listening. And it kind of brings us to the kind of observation that we began with from your ambassador, Yuto, about how in the streets of Tarawa, the conversations are at an everyday level and they're not susceptible to these kind of great sort of chess pieces being moved from one place to another. They're structural, they're sort of institutional, they're in relation to kind of things that are not, things that you can't necessarily send a troop of people to sort out or an air traffic to sort out or do training about necessarily. Again, from my perspective, it's limited to cannabis but I think it applies to most of the Pacific countries is that we're getting good vibes now from our development partners. We are willing to listen as opposed to previous decades of coming in. We know the solution we will solve. This is the problem. We will solve it for you. Now there's coming up this trend that we are willing to listen. We are willing to be partners rather than coming as aid providers and being your liberators, if not from military security but human security issues. There's this, but I think there's also good development in that. Not only our development partners willing to listen but they are also willing to say, okay, you lead the development. You lead the process. You know what your issues are. You already have some ideas on how to resolve these issues. So we are willing to listen and to give you the leeway to for country-led, locally-led development, if there's a proper word. That's the Fed now, especially with our Australian called partners. And I think the US is also saying, speaking the same language, we are willing to listen. We are willing to work with you and we want you to lead the process. So when it comes to security issues, like it has been mentioned, listen to what the local people, what the people on the streets see as security issues. Because at the end of the day, it is those people who elect the government of the country. And it is the government that the other governments have to talk to. So the governments that are elected into power will be speaking the language of the people who elected them. And the governments of different countries in the Pacific listen to what their people need. What are their everyday problems? What are their everyday security issues? And this they will bring to the negotiating tables with the development partners or the world powers, like the US, Australia, and also they will be discussing with China. And when we made some reference to China, China, when we used to be an ally of part, we had allegiance with China when we first became independent. And then in the late 1990s, we switched to Taiwan. And there was a negative perception of people about how China was. But now that we switch back to them, personally, I'm one of the people who was very surprised because they changed their approach. Although what they are doing is not always sustainable, but they are there, they respond, you know, and people accept, you know, they like to accept what they believe will elevate their living conditions. They may talk about sustainability later on, but they are there and they are willing to work with us and they are willing to help the people. The Australians, when the US was not visible in the Pacific Island region, the Australians that tried work with the Pacific Island countries, but they were sort of, what would be the proper word, they sort of remained a loop, you know, they gave assistance, they gave advice, but you could hardly see them out on the streets or in the communities. Now there's a change. I'm working for an education improvement program. I'm funded by the DEFET. And three, four years ago, they donated some things and said, we want, you want us to put a logo on this furniture? And they said, no, no, it's okay. Just give them low profile. But since the Chinese came, the Australians have been very active in their, yeah, yeah, and the communication strategy, you know, that they want to be seen and then they want to be visible also. And so people are now surprised and they say, oh, these chairs are provided by the Australian government. The same chairs that are sitting close by, they were provided by the Australian government five years ago, but nobody knew that they came from, from the Australian government. But now there's a competition and people are beginning to notice all the things that we are receiving from the Chinese, the school furniture, they are rusting, you know, they are corroding very quickly. This is what we want quality. And so that's coming into play now. And I think that's what, in terms of addressing human security, there needs to be visibility. There needs to be engagement with the local community, with the people, and it has to be a mutual partnership also. So it's almost like the sort of benefits of the competition in a way. That's right. There are risks, but at the moment I think my people at least are enjoying the benefits of the competition. We need to be able to take advantage of how we can use this competition to our advantage. Because if we are not careful, later date, and I don't think it's going to be very far, we are going to be drowned in the level of competition that we won't be able to, you know, we don't have the absorptive capacity to be able to deal with what is being offered to us. Yeah, I mean, I think it was in Solomon Islands and Samoa I read where the two governments sort of issued a, separately, but issued a circular, it said no more missions to come over the next two months because we're engaged in our budget process. And it kind of gets into the issue about not so much absorptive capacity, but simply there's only enough time in the day to deal with lots of people coming in. So we've got some people in the room here. We're in front of a very cavernous room with about 10 people in it, but we've also got a lot of people that are watching online. So I'd invite anyone that's in the room. I'd invite anyone that's sort of online to provide a question and to direct who you want the question to be answered to. So I'll give the privilege to people in the room rather than the people who are online. We've got about 10 minutes. So I'd ask you to try to be succinct in your questioning. And I know our participants will be concise in their answering. We'll take the two questions and then we'll take the ones online. Thank you. Thank you, Gordon. Thank you everyone for your presentations. I guess my question is, and we've heard, you know, we've heard a lot about the Pacific, the Pacific sees climate change and how the Pacific sees things. And I would agree with everything that you've said. I guess I'd like you to maybe Tara and maybe Maureen or anybody who wants to reflect on what we know are pre-existing and emerging rifts within the Pacific leadership and the Pacific collective and how they might affect this conversation about collective security. Thanks. Thank you. Michael Covrig from the International Crisis Group. I'd like to ask the one of the things that the United States has been talking about around this summit is its desire to support and strengthen the regional multilateral architecture for the region. So the Pacific Islands Forum but then also other regional mechanisms. I would like your views on what those organizations or forums or institutions, what are the most important things they currently do and what are they not doing that if they were in fact to become more effective stronger organizations, what would the people of the various island communities want them to be doing? Okay, great. So we've got a question about rifts and sort of differences sort of between Pacific Island nations. Then we've got one about strengthening regionalism and how does one go about doing that? He wants to take either one. Take one. I think we were facing micronexit as they called it at one point. And so I think if coming from Guam we're unseen by the US but we're often unseen by the Pacific as well and I think Micronesia, the other freely associated states have felt that too in certain ways, Kiribati Navrua in addition. And so that could have been a cleavage that easily could have been taken advantage of. I remember at the time even amongst sort of US strategic diplomatic circles like oh how do we take the northern Pacific and form more a sub-regional organization outside of PIF that will be sort of really supported by the United States government. How would we do that if they exited? And then others were saying oh China will use this to their advantage and so I think sort of the rift, micronexit is an example of a cleavage that could have been exploited. So that's the problem is that geopolitical competition has the ability to exacerbate current rifts as you mentioned and that's one prime example. I'm glad that it didn't end up going that way but I think we in the Pacific need to make sure that we prevent any of the self not externally imposed hierarchy of Polynesia, Micronesia, Melanesia into the way that we operate as a region. I'm a huge believer that we need to listen to the words of Appellia Ophola all the time. So I'm a self-described Halofian and I think our sea of islands needs to stay together even if that's but how do we do that is the question. And how do we prevent that unity from being exploited by great powers who would take the opportunity to do that and run what in a heartbeat would run away with it? Just to add to what Kenneth said, geopolitical competition have real impact both domestically at the national level as well as at regional level and those of us familiar with the Pacific Islands will know that collective diplomacy is very important to the region and because of the nature of who we are it is absolutely vital that we work together. But we are seeing rifts in the Pacific, not only in the case of the five Micronesian countries threatening to leave the Pacific Islands following what Kiribati did for a little while but came back but also on addressing issues like Fukushima for instance something that you've seen different Pacific Island countries saying different things. And perhaps that's not directly due to geopolitical competition but it does have an impact on the ground. And another example is Solomon Islands. So the rifts that we've seen in Solomon Islands between the central government and the Malay the provincial government who have been able to use the China competition with the West to create a huge division domestically and a lot of the politics is actually domestic but they've used geopolitical competition to express domestic politics. Thank you and we've got Megan who's my colleague here at United States and she's basically has got some questions that have come from the internet somewhere so Megan over to you. So we have two questions. One is from Alfred Schuster who's asking what benefits might there be for a PIF to open up membership to all Pacific Island countries and territories in light of geopolitical competition. And then Trisha Smart is asking I hear that each of you express concerns in various areas concerning securities. What would you say could commit to you by the U.S. Could you ask the second question again. Yes so Trisha is asking what would you say could show commitment to you by the U.S. Okay so I think that's a really that's a Trisha sort of stole the sort of my concluding question. It's like what is that what is something that would be a sign off commitment. You know we've heard a lot about but sort of different for very understandable reasons Pacific Island nation say well the not really sure of this narrative of the second or a war but once bitten twice shy on this what would be something that would show would be a kind of tangible sign of commitment would it be would it be the 25th would it be kind of embracing the boy declaration what would it be Maureen. I mean I think it's thinking through a lot of the questions around regional architecture and the reform it would be really good if our development partners particularly as we've seen the rift this coming back together and as Tara said it is the most difficult thing to all regional solidarity right now and the regions work really really hard but we see these real push particularly for membership expansion and I think there's been some troubling aspects to that discussed by policymakers is that the membership of the forum should be and restricted to sovereign countries at this point and we saw what happened when we had and particularly because foreign policy and defense needs to be in total control of what is what we understand as sovereign countries but it is a very difficult discussion in part because we recognize our indigenous brothers and sisters in territories that are still under colonial rule and still want to be part of the forum how does the forum grow in a safe way both for those that are full members and that so I think there's there's still avenues that we have to think through that may need to be reflected in a new reform architecture that really looks at how to relocate and I think that it would be very important we've seen in West Papua the case of West Papua what happened at the Melanesian spirit leaders meeting and how that issue but these are still an issue so I think this this cornerstone issues nuclear legacy self-determination aspiration political self-determination aspiration in our region really have to be part and parcel of a reformed regional architecture but for now the membership questions really are quite contentious and the way it plays to the kinds of development partners agendas can be quite destructive to regional unity and we've seen it on a host of issues so I think there's still a lot of work in the region as I said in terms of original institutions we have a plethora of frameworks strategies that anyone can look at but there is some real concerns that we need to really support and reform regional architecture I think the key phrase that anyone can look at I mean they're there and they're available and I'm glad that you you mentioned the issue of West Papua and the Melanesian spearhead group and it gets into it something I think we're stimulating discussion but we had any more time which is about the sort of potential new stakes that are that are that are in the region you've got Bougainville independence you have sort of chook independence movement as well but we're going to have to put that on for another time thank you to everyone in the room thank you to our four you know just wonderful um incisive uh panelists uh I hope you enjoyed I hope you got something out of it and um thank you once again I hope this this was the first but I hope it's not the last time that we that we get you all all together it's great to be in the room with you all thank you thank you