US-Pacific Summit: PM Chris Hipkins holds a media stand-up in Papua New Guinea

By RNZ

Chris Hipkins is holding a media stand-up in Papua New Guinea.

Hipkins is in the country for just 23 hours for the United States-Pacific Summit.

The US is poised to sign a deal with PNG that may give American armed forces uninhibited access to the island nation’s territorial waters and airspace.

Hipkins says he’s had constructive conversations with Prime Minister of PNG James Marape and Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Stephen Brown.

He says the agreement between the US and PNG is more of an extension of an existing relationship between the two countries, rather than a new thing. He says it’s not just about military presence, it’s also about development and relationship.

He says his conversations with Marape on the matter were mostly listening to the PNG perspective, and says he got “some greater clarity on what they’re aiming to achieve from the arrangement”.

“New Zealand doesn’t support militarisation of the Pacific. Having said that a military presence doesn’t necessarily signify militarisation.

“For example, New Zealand has a military presence in the Pacific regularly following natural disasters, we send military assets up here to support countries that have been affected by natural disasters.”

“We shouldn’t assume that all military partnerships are necessarily about conflict”.

He says the New Zealand message to all Pacific nations is we are a trusted partner with the interests of all Pacific nations at heart, but recognises they are sovereign nations.

He said the Aukus partnership may come up in conversation with the US but it has not yet.

Prime Minister Chris Hipkins being welcomed into Port Moresby in Papua New Guinea. Photo / RNZ

“New Zealand’s position on Aukus has been clear from the beginning, we don’t see ourselves as being part of any nuclear arrangement which is the primary driver of Aukus. In terms of what they might be talking about under the second pillar, that’s not yet clear, as we’ve already indicated.”

He says the relationship with India is already very warm, with a lot of people-to-people exchange and it is already a major trading partner.

“So we see opportunity to grow that to mutual benefit for both countries.”

He says as a former education minister he knows India highly values the international education relationship and sees it as a potential area of growth.

Part of his conversation with Marape also went over climate change mitigation and resilience, with the effects of climate change already being felt in Papua New Guinea.

“Our international contributions to the climate effort have never been more important.”

“I think things like helping to build energy resilience and core infrastructure - particularly around transport and so on.”

He says he’s not going to pass judgment on the PNG-US agreement, saying “it’s a question for the countries concerned, they’re ultimately entitled to have their own arrangements”.

“We don’t come here to tell them what to do or what to think, we come here to engage in discussion with them recognising that our ... brothers and sisters here in the Pacific are entitled to chart their own course and determine their own futures but New Zealand certainly wants to be part of that.”

The summit is Hipkins’ first chance for face-to-face meetings with Pacific leaders in the top job after he pulled out of an earlier engagement because of Cyclone Gabrielle.

Heading into a one-on-one meeting with Hipkins this morning, PNG Prime Minister James Marape said his country was facing “challenging” security issues and highlighted illegal fishing as a problem, saying unlawful boats were lighting up the coastal waters like skyscrapers.

Hipkins is also set to have bilateral meetings with Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and India Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“It will be an opportunity to catch up with [Pacific leaders] and a good opportunity to further the relationship with India as well; a relationship that’s also very important to New Zealand,” Hipkins previously said.