The United States aims to counter China by opening the Solomon Islands Embassy
Wellington (AP) The United States says it will open an embassy in the Solomon Islands and, in unusually sharp terms, lay out a plan to increase its influence in the South Pacific before China is heavily embedded.
The reasoning was explained in a statement from the State Department to Congress, which was obtained by the Associated Press.
The plan was confirmed by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a visit to Fiji on Saturday on a Pacific tour that began in Australia.
Blinken left Fiji late at night on his way to Hawaii, where he will host the foreign ministers of Japan and South Korea to discuss the threat from North Korea, amid growing concern over its latest missile test.
The State Department said Solomon Islanders loved their history with Americans on the battlefields during World War II, but that the United States was in danger of losing its preferential ties as China aggressively sought to engage elite politicians and businessmen in the Solomon Islands.
The move comes after riots rocked the nation by 700,000 in November. The riots grew out of a peaceful protest, highlighting protracted regional rivalry, economic problems and concerns about the country’s growing ties with China, after the country shifted allegiance from the autonomous island of Taiwan to Beijing three years ago. Rebels set fire to buildings and looted shops.
Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare survived a no-confidence motion the following month, telling lawmakers in a burning 90-minute speech that he had done nothing wrong and would not bow to the forces of evil or to Taiwan’s agents.
The United States previously operated an embassy in the Solomon Islands for five years before closing it in 1993. Since then, U.S. diplomats from neighboring Papua New Guinea have been accredited to the Solomon Islands, which has a U.S. consular agency.
The embassy’s announcement fits with a new Biden administration strategy for the Indo-Pacific, announced Friday, and underscores the building of partnerships with allies in the region as a way to counter China’s growing influence and ambitions.
In its statement to Congress, the State Department said China had used a familiar pattern of extravagant promises, potentially expensive infrastructure loans and potentially dangerous debt levels when in dialogue with Solomon Islands political and business leaders.
The United States has a strategic interest in strengthening our political, economic and commercial relations with the Solomon Islands, the largest Pacific island nation without a U.S. embassy, the State Department wrote.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it did not expect to build a new embassy immediately, but would initially rent space for an initial establishment price of DKK 12.4 million. The embassy would be located in the capital, Honiara, and would start small, with two U.S. employees and about five local employees.
The State Department said the Peace Corps was planning to reopen an office in the Solomon Islands and get its volunteers to serve there, and that several U.S. agencies were establishing government positions with portfolios in the Solomon Islands.
The department should be a part of this increased American presence instead of remaining a remote player, it wrote.
During his visit to Fiji, Blinken met with acting Prime Minister Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum and other Pacific leaders to discuss regional issues, in particular the existential risk posed by climate change. It was the first visit by a US Secretary of State to Fiji since 1985.
Sayed-Khaiyum said he welcomed the renewed US engagement in the region and President Joe Biden’s move last year to rejoin the Paris Agreement. He said formerly island nations had sometimes felt overlooked by larger nations such as flyover countries.
Small dots seen from airplane windows of leaders on their way to meetings where they talked about us instead of with us if they talked about us at all, he said.
Blinken and the Pacific leaders also talked about the coronavirus pandemic and disaster relief. But over the visit were the rising tensions in Ukraine.
We continue to see very, very worrying signs of Russian escalation, including new forces arriving around Ukraine’s borders, Blinken said.
Blinken visited Fiji after leaving the Australian city of Melbourne, where he had a meeting with his colleagues from Australia, India and Japan. The four nations form the so-called Quad, a bloc of Indo-Pacific democracies created to counter China’s regional influence. (AP)
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