Papua New Guinea Cabinet approves defense treaty with Australia

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MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Papua New Guinea’s Cabinet has approved a bilateral defense treaty with near neighbor Australia, paving the way for the nations’ leaders to sign a landmark agreement that U.S. allies hope will curb Chinese influence in the region.

Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape confirmed Thursday that the treaty had been formally approved by his Cabinet.

"Australia has only one other mutual defense treaty of this type and at our request Papua New Guinea will now sign this treaty,” Marape said in a statement. Australia's other alliance-status pact is the ANZUS Treaty signed in 1951 with the United States and New Zealand.

“This reflects the depth of trust, history, and shared future between our two nations,” Marape added.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he and Marape would sign the treaty soon.

“Our two nations are the closest of neighbors and the closest of friends, and this treaty will elevate our relationship to a formal alliance,” Albanese said in a statement.

Australia was Papua New Guinea's colonial master until the developing island nation became independent in 1975. Australia, with its population of 28 million, and Papua New Guinea, with an estimated population of roughly 10 million, are the most populous nations in the South Pacific.

The United States and Australia have both increased military ties in recent years with Papua New Guinea, which is seen as a strategically important partner in countering China’s growing influence in the Pacific.

The new Australia-Papua New Guinea pact would vastly increase integration of military equipment and personnel.

Marape and and Albanese had hoped to sign the pact at a ceremony in Port Moresby on Sept. 17. But a Cabinet meeting scheduled two days earlier to endorse the agreement never took place.

Instead, Marape and Albanese signed a joint statement supporting the treaty’s core principles.

The treaty would recognize that “an armed attack on Australia or Papua New Guinea would be a danger to the peace and security of both countries,” the statement said.

It would also allow for the first time Papua New Guinea citizens to serve in the Australian Defense Force, potentially filling Australia’s longstanding recruitment shortfall. Papua New Guineans could use their service as a pathway to Australian citizenship.

China’s embassy in Port Moresby criticized the leaders’ joint statement, saying such a bilateral treaty “should not be exclusive in nature, nor should it restrict or prevent a sovereign country from cooperating with a third party for any reason.”

“It should also refrain from targeting any third party or undermining its legitimate rights and interests,” the embassy posted on social media.

It is a balancing act for Papua New Guinea, which also seeks closer economic cooperation with China.

Oliver Nobetau, project director of the Australia–Papua New Guinea Network at the Sydney-based Lowy Institute international policy think tank, said there was concern in Papua New Guinea that a closer defense relationship with Australia could damage its economic relationship with China.

“The Papua New Guinea government, especially James Marape, has come out and demarcated how they see the bilateral relationships moving forward: now with the security space, siding with Australia’s traditional Western allies. And definitely in the economic and trade space, building up that relationship with China,” Nobetau told Australian Broadcasting Corp.

Australia has stepped up efforts to bolster relations with island nations in the region since 2022, when Beijing struck a security deal with Solomon Islands that has raised the prospect of a Chinese naval base being established in the South Pacific.

Three Pacific island nations have changed their allegiances from Taiwan to Beijing since 2019 as China’s influence in the region has grown. The U.S. and its allies are particularly concerned by China’s growing sway in security through police training in Fiji, Kiribati, Samoa, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.