The United States must work harder in the Pacific

By Lucy Craymer

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – New Zealand will begin talks with Australia on Wednesday on cooperation with the AUKUS trilateral defense partnership between Australia, Britain and the United States. Foreign Minister Winston Peters said this, adding that Washington must do more in the Pacific to counter other political influences. There.

Peters will travel to Australia on Wednesday for an inaugural joint meeting of the New Zealand and Australian foreign and defense ministers, and said the talks would also explore what joining an expanded AUKUS group would mean for Wellington.

“The second pillar (of AUKUS) is the exam that we will look at starting tonight and tomorrow and going forward,” he told Reuters in an interview.

The “second pillar” of the AUKUS pact is separate from the first pillar designed to provide nuclear-powered attack submarines to Australia, but what any new deal would entail is not yet public. New Zealand has had an anti-nuclear policy since the 1980s and there has been no indication that this will change.

Peters also said the United States has neglected the Pacific since World War II, and that has created a void that others have filled.

“They have certainly improved their level, but they need to work harder on the immediate problems at the local level of many island nations,” he said.

Peters did not mention China by name, but the struggle between Washington and Beijing for influence in the Pacific has escalated in recent years over issues such as security, defense, aid and infrastructure.

Peters, who served as foreign secretary from 2005 to 2008 and again from 2017 to 2020, returned to the role in late 2023, when a new Conservative coalition government was elected.

In 2017, Peters launched a “Pacific Reset” disbursing aid and strengthening engagement with the region, in an effort to woo neighboring countries at a time when China was significantly increasing its presence in the region.