Australia to counter China’s influence in the South Pacific

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has moved to counter China's growing influence in the Pacific by announcing that it is time Australia make a "step-up to the Pacific."

In his first landmark Pacific policy address, the newly installed PM said Australia will commit a new to the Pacific, setting up a multibillion-dollar infrastructure bank to fund projects in the region and appointing a series of new diplomatic posts.

Morrison aims to make the Pacific the center of Australian foreign policy. The centerpiece of that will be an $A2 billion facility to fund major regional projects.

He said Australia needs a "southwest Pacific that is secure strategically, stable economically, and sovereign politically."

The PM is promising nearby Pacific nations closer economic, military and diplomatic ties, following a decade of Chinese expansion.

"Australia will step up in the Pacific and take our engagement with the region to a new level," the prime minister said Thursday.

"While we have natural advantages in terms of history, proximity and shared values, Australia cannot take its influence in the southwest Pacific for granted, and too often we have," Morrison said.

Morrison announced new defense force mobile-training team, annual meetings of defense, police, and border security chiefs, and new diplomatic posts in a number of Pacific countries.

The centerpiece will be a $2 billion AUD financial facility to help fund major regional projects while the existing export financing agency (EFA) will be boosted by another one billion dollars.

Referring to Australia's 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper, Morrison said the stability and economic progress of the Pacific region are of "fundamental importance," and no single country can tackle the challenges on its own.

Morrison said it was time Australia opened a "new chapter in relations with our Pacific family."

"This is not just our region or our neighborhood. It's our home”.

Morrison flagged that the region requires around $4 billion per year in investments up to 2030, adding, "It's where Australia can make the biggest difference in world affairs."

Today, China is the region's biggest bilateral lender, although Australia's significant aid programs mean it remains the largest financial backer in the South Pacific.

While China has always maintained a political stake in the region as part of its ongoing diplomatic chess battle with Taiwan, the sheer magnitude and speed of Chinese assistance eventually raised alarms and even hysteria among Western-aligned nations that the string of southern Pacific island states was very quickly falling under Beijing's influence.