Thinking about the future of Pacific security

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Anna Naupa - 15 Jul 2024

Thinking about the future of Pacific security

The recent launch of the Pacific Regional Security Outlook 2023-24 by the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat and the Pacific Fusion Centre forecasts an increasingly complex security environment dominated by intersecting strategic challenges, both national and regional (p6). Concurrent traditional security flashpoints in various regions are deteriorating the international security environment and straining multilateral systems. As…

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A PNG-Australia security framework: not a treaty but solid nonetheless

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Henry Ivarature - 11 Dec 2023

A PNG-Australia security framework: not a treaty but solid nonetheless

Papua New Guinea PM James Marape and Australian PM Anthony Albanese face the media after signing a historical Bilateral Security Agreement on 7 December in Canberra. Credit: PM Albanese Facebook   On 7 December 2023, the prime ministers of Australia and Papua New Guinea signed an historic security agreement in Canberra. It has taken approximately…

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Australia must play a key role in the Pacific’s push to decarbonise shipping

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Heather Wrathall and Kate Archer - 25 Oct 2023

Australia must play a key role in the Pacific’s push to decarbonise shipping

There is an opportunity for Australia to work with Pacific islands to invest in new technology and take a leadership role in the decarbonisation of shipping in the region. Pacific leaders have stated their priority to transition to a fossil fuel free Pacific. Collectively they recently failed at getting the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) to…

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The Islands Blocking Vanuatu-France Relations

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Ben Bohane - 24 Aug 2023

The Islands Blocking Vanuatu-France Relations

President Macron promises to resolve a territorial dispute with Vanuatu, writes Ben Bohane in Port Vila. When French President Emmanuel Macron appeared at the Melanesian Arts Festival in Vanuatu recently, he received a rousing welcome from the crowd by speaking in the three official languages of Vanuatu: Bislama, French and English.  “Let me tell you…

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Pacific Islands are holding the front line of climate change, but this is a global fight

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Professor Mark Howden, Mahealani Delaney, ‘Ofa Ma’asi-Kaisamy - 30 Mar 2023

Pacific Islands are holding the front line of climate change, but this is a global fight

We know how to keep warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius and avoid the worst climate change impacts for Pacific Island nations. But we must act now, and action must be worldwide. This week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released a new report, bringing together seven years of research on the global state of climate…

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Plural Policing in the Pacific Islands

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Sinclair Dinnen - 8 Mar 2023

Plural Policing in the Pacific Islands

Can the plural qualities of Pacific Islands policing be harnessed to produce better security outcomes for all? While we commonly think of it as the domain of professional police officers, a broader conception of policing reveals a more complex and plural reality. If we take policing to include order maintenance, peacekeeping, rule & law enforcement,…

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