The 16-paged document, entitled “Pacific Partnership Strategy of the United States” and obtained by Newsweek, details a push by the Biden administration to forge stronger influence in a region that “spans nearly 15 percent of the Earth’s surface — part of an ‘ocean continent’ eight times the size of the United States.”
The strategy includes four major objectives, including building “a strong U.S.-Pacific partnership,” achieving a “united Pacific islands region connected to the world,” realizing “a resilient Pacific islands regions prepared for the climate crisis and other 21st century challenges” and supporting “empowered and prosperous Pacific islanders.”
But the effort emerges against a backdrop of intensifying competition between the U.S. and China in the region.
The strategy quoted a section of the “2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent” released in June by the Pacific Islands Forum, which stated that “we occupy a vitally significant place in global strategic terms. As a consequence, heightened geopolitical competition impacts our Member countries.”
The new White House document ties the impact language of the strategy to China’s economic strategy in the region.
“Increasingly, those impacts include pressure and economic coercion by the People’s Republic of China,” the White House document states, “which risks undermining the peace, prosperity, and security of the region, and by extension, of the United States.”
In response, Liu Pengyu, spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C., defended the approach of the People’s Republic to the nearby region.
“China and Pacific island countries, both in the Asia-Pacific region, are good friends and partners of mutual respect, equality, mutual benefit and common development,” Liu told Newsweek. “The development of bilateral relations is not aimed at any third party. China has long provided economic and technical assistance to the island countries without any political strings attached.”
“China has carried out more than 100 assistance projects and provided more than 200 batches of material assistance,” he said, “trained about 10,000 people in various fields for the island countries, sent 600 medical teams to the island countries and benefited 260,000 people.”
“It is nonsense to accuse China of endangering regional peace and stability,” he added.
The Pacific island region has long been a focus of China’s foreign policy. Chinese President Xi Jinping has particularly prioritized the region as of late, emphasizing that it was a mutually beneficial partnership.
“China believes that any cooperation initiative with Pacific island countries should conform to the trend of the times for peaceful development and win-win cooperation and respect the independence and sovereignty of Pacific island countries,” Liu said, “instead of serving the geopolitical needs of some major countries to maintain regional hegemony.”
A fact sheet released by the Chinese Foreign Ministry in May stated that Beijing and Pacific islands “have continued to expand exchanges and cooperation in more than 20 areas, including trade, investment, ocean affairs, environmental protection, disaster prevention and mitigation, poverty alleviation, health care, education, tourism, culture, sports and at the sub-national level.”
The release came as Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi launched a 10-day tour of the region, visiting eight countries — the Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Timor Leste.
The trip came on the heels of an unprecedented security pact signed in April between China and the Solomon Islands. The deal raised concerns for Washington, which has tried to dissuade countries from fostering closer ties to Beijing as the two leading powers continue to vie for influence across the globe.
In July, Vice President Kamala Harris spoke virtually at the Pacific Islands Forum hosted in Fiji, vowing greater engagement with the region that she acknowledged had not received sufficient U.S. foreign policy attention in the past.
And the Biden administration has been trying to coax the region into a multilateral agreement of its own, but Solomons Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare has been particularly opposed to entering into any such arrangements.
Speaking at the first-ever in-person summit between the U.S. and Pacific island nations in Washington, however, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that the parties had come “together around a declaration of partnership between the U.S. and the Pacific.” This included a “shared vision for the future and a determination to build that future together.”
That same day, Biden made reference to the U.S.-China competition and the recent diplomatic focus on the Pacific islands during an address to Democratic Governors Association. And he spoke directly to his meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping, with whom he said he had met for “over 78 hours, 68 of which are in person, over the last 10 years.”
“I was asked what my objective was when I was with Xi Jinping, and I said to reestablish America’s relationships on democracies,” Biden said. “And he was very upset about that, and he thought it was all about China. It’s not about China. It’s about world peace. It’s about security.”
“So I spent an awful lot of time, and I’ll be doing it tomorrow with the ASEAN countries, the Pacific Islanders,” he added, “making sure that we’re dealing in the Middle East, as well as in Africa and South America, et cetera.”
Biden was expected to address the visiting leaders on Thursday afternoon in order “to demonstrate the United States’ deep and enduring partnership with Pacific Island countries.”
A fact sheet released by the White House on Thursday detailed more specific measures being offered to Pacific island states, including $810 million in expanded programs, diplomatic recognition of the Cook Islands and Niue—two self-governing islands in free association with New Zealand—as sovereign states and a new array of envoys to the region.
This is a developing news story. More information will be added as it becomes available.
