US Vice President Kamala Harris, in a video address to the Pacific Islands Forum Suva on Wednesday, said US funding for the Pacific Islands would be tripled to $60 million a year for a decade, subject to the approval by Congress.
Some Pacific leaders seek to balance China’s ambitions for trade and security ties in the region.
Mr Harris called on nations to “stand together” as bad actors seek to undermine the rules-based international order, without naming them.
“We recognize that in recent years the Pacific Islands may not have received the diplomatic attention and support you deserve,” she said.
Pacific leaders gathered for the four-day forum see climate change as the region’s top security issue, but tensions between China and the United States, as well as Kiribati’s surprise withdrawal from the forum, are also discussed. .
“It really shows that the United States is back and wants to play an active role,” Palau President Surangel Whipps Jr. said after Harris’ speech.
“Sometimes, because of our distance, we are forgotten, so that was important,” he told Reuters.
The forum will discuss an attempt by China to sign a trade and security agreement with 10 nations with ties to China, which some members oppose.
Palau has a defense relationship with the United States, diplomatic ties with Taiwan, and an economic relationship with China.
“The sky is the limit with the opportunity with China. This competition sometimes creates security concerns. We lived through World War II and we don’t want to go through that again,” he said.
Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, who has a security deal with China that has raised concerns in the United States, did not attend Mr Harris’ speech because he was in a bilateral meeting, but the Solomons were represented, his spokesman said. The Solomons are parties to the US Pacific Fisheries Treaty.
The United States concludes negotiations on the renewal of the fishing treaty with Pacific island nations, which has allowed American vessels to fish in the exclusive economic zones for decades, and offers increased support for maritime surveillance in the Pacific.
Fiji Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama said the fishing treaty offered the United States a platform to “balance” strategic weaknesses in the Pacific.
Palau’s fisheries minister, Steven Victor, said tourism and fishing were the nation’s only sources of revenue, and US funding had stagnated for 20 years.
Kiribati, which is also dependent on fisheries, reached fisheries agreements with China after switching diplomatic ties from Tawan to Beijing in 2019, a month after the forum last met face-to-face.
A spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry said at a press briefing on Monday that “China has enjoyed good cooperation with the Pacific Islands Forum for many years.”