Goff reveals planned police, military numbers for Solomons

4.00pm

ADELAIDE - New Zealand will look to send between 30 and 40 police officers and 100-200 military forces to the Solomons Islands as part of the South Pacific's intervention in the violence-torn archipelago, Foreign Affairs Minister Phil Goff said today.

The Australia-led intervention plan is dependent on a formal request from assistance from the Solomon Islands Government -- due next month -- and the agreement of other South Pacific nations, expected to be garnered at a meeting of the Pacific Island Forum foreign ministers in Sydney tomorrow.

Mr Goff was in South Australia at the weekend for talks with Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who said an intervention force could be on the islands by late July if all the preliminary approvals were gained, which he thought likely.

He said the Solomons government would also have to give legal guarantees over the safety of police and military going to the islands.

Both Australia and New Zealand governments have given in-principle approval for the mission.

Australia would be the dominant force in any intervention co-operative, providing around 150 of 200 police, backed up a couple of thousand troops, though only a few hundred of them would be on the islands backing up police. The remainder would be offshore on a naval ship.

Mr Goff said New Zealand involvement was also contingent on cabinet approval.

He told reporters at a press conference at Adelaide airport after the talks that New Zealand currently gave $8 million in aid to the Solomons and it might have to double that amount.

"Some of it would come out of existing budgetary vote for aid, being reorganised from one area to another, some may need to be new money."

He said the money would go towards restoring key services, such as justice, health and education being restored.

"If you want the rule of law not only do you have to have a policing deployment you have to have a justice system that can properly process those that are arrested by the police.

"You also have to a corrections system in which to keep people secure that have been prosecuted by the courts.

"For a short term we need to do more so that the Solomons Islands can get back on its own feet and do these things for itself."

Mr Goff said if current aid was withdrawn, education and health services on the Solomons would collapse."

- NZPA