It was only a few months prior, in April, that Sogavare had signed a five-year security agreement with China, paving the way for potential deployment of police and military forces from Beijing to the Pacific island state.
This agreement was met with consternation and alarm in Canberra and other Western capitals.
It was seen, correctly, as a further attempt by China to push its strategic interests in the southwest Pacific and establish security and military infrastructure beyond its Second Island Chain. And a move that would, unhelpfully, introduce the dynamics of great-power contest into this politically fragile region.
Senator Penny Wong, now Foreign Minister, declared the signing of this pact “the worst Australian foreign policy blunder in the Pacific since the end of World War II”. At the time, Albanese linked the pact with Australia’s climate change policies, claiming we had been relegated to the “naughty corner” in the Pacific because of inadequate emissions reductions.
So with Albanese now having got off to a warm start with Sogavare, and the government having increased Australia’s 2030 emissions reduction target to 43 per cent, is Solomon Islands less of a worry for Australia? Far from it.
This week the Solomon Islands government declared all US Navy vessels will be prohibited from entering its ports, pending new approval procedures being put in place. This follows earlier incidents of US Coast Guard vessel the Oliver Henry and Royal Navy vessel HMS Spey being prevented from making routine port calls in Solomon Islands because the government did not respond to standard diplomatic clearance requests.
Last month, Sogavare’s government sought to push back elections due in mid-2023. A bill tabled in parliament seeks to amend the constitution and extend the term of the parliament and government by a year.
Huawei, the Chinese telecommunications company banned from bidding for 5G contracts in Australia and a number of Western nations, has been awarded a contract to build 161 mobile phone towers across Solomon Islands. This is to be financed with a $100m loan from the Export Import Bank of China, in a deal being criticised for not stacking up economically and posing a substantial financial risk to Solomon Islands.
Meanwhile the Solomon Islands’ publicly funded national broadcaster, Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation, has been ordered to engage in self-censorship, only broadcasting content that portrays the nation’s government in a positive light.
And foreign journalists have been told they may be denied entry to Solomon Islands if they criticise its ties to China.
Extending the term of the Prime Minister. Postponing elections. Censoring the media. Switching security partners. Debt diplomacy.
All this is redolent of an autocratic leader during the time of the Cold War. But this is happening now. And not in Africa or the Middle East, but in Australia’s own neighbourhood.
Solomon Islands is on a deeply concerning trajectory under Sogavare.
Australia and our allies have effectively operated a Monroe Doctrine in the southwest Pacific. We have ensured the region remains firmly within the Western security orbit, and deterred intervention and meddling by foreign powers.
China’s growing ambitions are now challenging this, and we must get to grips with the scale of the challenge. It’s not simply a matter of turning up at meetings, giving hugs and making the right noises on climate change. Australia needs a strategy to check these moves and provide alternatives.
When Huawei was planning to build the undersea cable to Papua New Guinea, the Coalition government stepped in and financed the Coral Sea Cable project, keeping this critical infrastructure in sovereign hands.
When Digicel Pacific, one of the major telecommunications providers in the Pacific, looked like it might be bought out by a Chinese state-owned enterprise, the Coalition government supported Telstra to buy it instead.
We established the Australian Infrastructure Financing Facility for the Pacific, providing an alternative financing vehicle to China’s state-owned banks.
What is the Albanese government proposing to keep Solomon Islands in our camp?
Any such strategy must be more than just development and infrastructure. It also needs to be about institutions and governance.
The prospective establishment of a client-state autocracy in our neighbourhood – a Cuba in the Pacific – demands urgent action.
The Australian government should start by speaking out against these recent moves to curtail press freedom and postpone elections, topics on which it has been conspicuously silent.
It should also energise the Pacific Islands Forum – which is committed to upholding democracy through the Biketawa Declaration – to become involved.
This is what the future of strategic competition in our region looks like. Australia needs to step up our game. Patting ourselves on the back about higher emissions reduction targets and declaring “job done” will not cut it.
Dave Sharma is the former Liberal MP for Wentworth and ambassador to Israel from 2013-2017.
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Those who saw the images of Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare greeting Anthony Albanese with a warm hug in Suva several weeks back could be forgiven for thinking Australia’s challenges with our Solomon Islands relationship were behind us.