“US Signs Security Pact with Papua New Guinea to Counter Chinese Influence in Indo-Pacific”

It is a new pawn that Washington is advancing in the Indo-Pacific. This Monday, the United States will sign a security pact with Papua New Guinea that will give American forces access to the ports and airports of this Pacific country, where Washington is seeking to counter China’s influence.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is visiting Papua New Guinea for the US-Pacific Islands Forum meeting in Port Moresby, which opens on Monday. Joe Biden, whose uncle died in Papua New Guinea during World War II, was originally to become the first US president to visit that country on Monday. But he canceled his trip because of the negotiations on the public debt of the United States, and was replaced by Antony Blinken.

Surveillance satellites

Prior to this meeting, the US Secretary of State will sign a cooperation agreement in the field of defense and maritime surveillance. This agreement will “enhance security cooperation, further strengthen our bilateral relations […] and to increase stability and security in the region,” the US State Department said.

It will thus give the United States access to the waters of Papua New Guinea near the maritime routes to Australia and Japan, in exchange for access to American surveillance satellites, the Prime Minister of Papua explained on Thursday. -New Guinea, James Marape.

If this pact is presented as an agreement aimed at protecting the country’s borders, China’s ambitions in the Pacific are a key reason for the American commitment in this region, point out the experts. “Even if China is not mentioned anywhere in the document, it is underlying the deepening of relations between the United States and Papua New Guinea”, analyzes Gordon Peake, of the Institute of – United for peace.

For a “free and open” Indo-Pacific

James Marape, however, clarified that this agreement would not prevent him from entering into similar alliances with other countries, including China.

At the end of April, Australia announced that it was rethinking its defense strategy in the face of new threats hovering in its immediate vicinity. The Australian government had thus presented the most important reform of its national defense since the Second World War. This week at the G7 summit in Hiroshima, Japan, its members urged China to respect a “free and open” Indo-Pacific.

Source AFP