PNG ties are important to maintain regional security
A historic invitation to address the Papua New Guinea parliament gives Anthony Albanese an opportunity to clearly express the close ties that bind Australia and our nearest neighbour, and to confirm our determination that they be maintained. Faced with increased competition for regional attention from China, it is also an opportunity to outline how Australia sees PNG’s role as part of the broader Pacific family. Australian assistance to PNG has always been focused on improving the lot of ordinary Papua New Guineans and delivered with no strings attached. There has been a longstanding refrain in Port Moresby and the Pacific that Australia delivers what it promises, unlike some others who make grand gestures but fail to back them up with cash. Australia’s total development assistance to PNG in 2022-23 is budgeted at $602m, down from a high of $745m during the pandemic. Australia has also provided PNG with about $1.2bn in budget support loans since 2019.
Ahead of his visit, delayed from December because of Covid, the Prime Minister has been left in no doubt that more will be required. PNG Prime Minister James Marape is seeking further loans as well as training for the local police force.
A defence treaty between the two countries is also likely to be progressed, but Foreign Minister Justin Tkatchenko has made it clear that PNG wants Australia’s aid program to focus on the priority areas of health, education, and law and order.
A priority for Australia is to continue efforts to improve PNG’s systems of governance. The challenges faced by PNG cannot be underestimated. Poverty, a breakdown in law and order, tribal warfare and entrenched corruption are systemic.
The economic challenge was brought into sharp relief by a new UN study that found the population of PNG has been widely underestimated. PNG’s population could be as high 17 million, double the official estimate, greatly reducing living standards. Australia will offer to fund an official census in 2024 to bring clarity to the issue.
As Ben Packham reports on Thursday, Mr Albanese will be the first foreign leader to be offered an address to PNG’s parliament, reflecting the strength of the countries’ relationship. Australia is PNG’s biggest foreign aid donor and shares deep regional security concerns. Australia and the US have been keen to deepen defence ties, including through a $175m upgrade of the strategically located deepwater Lombrum Naval Base on Manus Island. In November 2018, Scott Morrison and Peter O’Neill, the PNG prime minister at the time, formally committed to the new joint defence initiative. The deal blocked Chinese efforts to build its own deepwater port on Manus amid concerns over China’s increasing economic influence over Pacific Island nations. A joint redevelopment of Lombrum would provide US and Australian navies with refuelling facilities as well as a strategic maritime surveillance point for both countries. After it was announced, the port redevelopment raised objections from Indonesia that it would “increase political tensions” and open the way for foreign powers to “militarise the Asia-Pacific”.
PNG says it will allow foreign navy ships to dock and refuel but it is now reluctant to allow the US and Australian navies a presence in what would be a joint facility. Mr Tkatchenko said this was in part mindful of its trading relationship with China.
PNG is free to make its own security decisions but Mr Albanese must take his opportunity to emphasise the importance we place on regional security and how we see PNG’s position in it.