On Thursday, Pacific leaders will depart Honiara for the annual retreat \u2013 a function designed to give them space to debate regional issues without officials present. <\/p>\n
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon takes time to speak to media during a visit to Honiara Senior High School in the Solomon Islands. Photo \/ Adam Pearse<\/p>\n
Having touched down shortly after midnight on Tuesday, Luxon arrived in time for the forum\u2019s plenary meeting, held a bilateral meeting with Fiji PM Sitiveni Rabuka and made a visit to Honiara Senior High School.<\/p>\n
Speaking to New Zealand media at the school, Luxon confirmed he would have discussions while attending the forum about increasing the number of Kiwi police officers based in the Pacific. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m very happy to,\u201d Luxon said when asked if New Zealand would put more boots on the ground. <\/p>\n
He argued a sharp rise in methamphetamine use and trafficking in the region warranted such a response, citing a 15-times higher price point for the drug in the Pacific amid \u201cbig inroads\u201d by United States-based organised crime groups and Mexican cartels.<\/p>\n
The move would be part of the Pacific policing initiative, a proposal born alongside China increasing its number of police personnel in several Pacific nations. <\/p>\n
Luxon said he had no concerns a greater New Zealand presence would be viewed as combating China\u2019s efforts, instead claiming the approach to policing aligned well with its neighbours. <\/p>\n
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon stops for selfies. Photo \/ Adam Pearse<\/p>\n
Luxon\u2019s comments echo the thoughts of Police Commissioner Richard Chambers, who the Herald revealed last month was speaking with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to assess opportunities to increase officer numbers in the Pacific. <\/p>\n
While at the school, Luxon also said he had spoken at least twice with his Cook Islands counterpart since New Zealand paused about $20 million in funding to the self-governing nation after it signed several agreements with China in February.<\/p>\n
The agreements, which concerned economic, infrastructure and maritime co-operation, had prompted international warnings about the influence China could have over Cook Islanders, who were also New Zealand citizens. <\/p>\n
New Zealand was unaware of Brown\u2019s intention to sign those deals, which prompted frustration as the free association relationship between the two nations required him to notify New Zealand of such agreements. <\/p>\n
Since the funding pause in June, officials from both sides had been working to understand the ramifications of the deals. <\/p>\n
Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown during the Pacific Islands Forum. Photo \/ Pacific Islands Forum<\/p>\n
Luxon has now confirmed he spoke with Brown, once while leaving the All Blacks\u2019 test on Saturday and again this morning while in the Solomon Islands. <\/p>\n
However, it appeared little had changed since June. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur officials need to work out those solutions before we have a deeper political engagement,\u201d Luxon said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur officials have some work to do to make sure that we\u2019re comfortable with the management of the risks associated with those recent agreements that we\u2019ve talked about, but you know, we can be civil and constructive in the same way.\u201d<\/p>\n
PM gets more than he bargains for at school visit<\/p>\n
Normally when the Prime Minister visits a school he doesn\u2019t get charged by young men brandishing whips, axes and a bow and arrow. <\/p>\n
While he would have been briefed before his visit to Honiara Senior High School, Luxon clearly wasn\u2019t expecting to be ambushed by half a dozen weapon-wielding warriors screaming at him the moment he stepped out of the car, a custom designed to assess a visitor\u2019s intentions. <\/p>\n
Luxon couldn\u2019t help but jump slightly as the boys approached \u2013 the all-too-familiar instinctual flash of fear written on his face for a moment before he regained composure. <\/p>\n
One can hardly fault him. The archer ventured so close it would have made the trigger fingers of Luxon\u2019s personal security guards twitch. <\/p>\n
To his credit, Luxon admitted as much as he was greeted by his hosts: \u201cI got out of the car and didn\u2019t quite know what was coming.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon cuts a cake with the Solomon Islands Education Minister Tozen Leokana during a visit to Honiara Senior High School. Photo \/ Adam Pearse<\/p>\n
The visit progressed in typical fashion after that, Luxon celebrating spending $60m over the next 10 years to enhance education outcomes in the Solomon Islands. <\/p>\n
His speech could have easily been lifted from the countless addresses Luxon has given about improving New Zealand\u2019s educational achievement. <\/p>\n
The only thing missing was the cellphone ban; some of the 200 students in the audience filming Luxon as he spoke. <\/p>\n
That didn\u2019t escape Luxon as he mingled with students afterwards, explaining to one boy how his phone would be banned in New Zealand and pondering whether he should mention that to the Solomon Islands Education Minister. The boy looked unfazed. <\/p>\n
With a tendency to speak to anyone who asks for a chat or selfie, Luxon\u2019s security was evidently concerned for the PM\u2019s uncovered head in the thick Solomon Islands heat and his staff discussed when sunscreen was last applied. <\/p>\n
One of the local police drew the short straw, holding a large black umbrella over Luxon when he was in direct sunlight for the remainder of his visit.<\/p>\n
Adam Pearse is the Deputy Political Editor and part of the NZ Herald\u2019s Press Gallery team based at Parliament in Wellington. He has worked for NZME since 2018, reporting for the Northern Advocate in Whang\u0101rei and the Herald in Auckland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Thursday, Pacific leaders will depart Honiara for the annual retreat \u2013 a function designed to give them…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[16425,12635,16421,16424,16426,16423,5760,226,78,5345,16427,1868,6722,2683,117,111,43,139,69,13572,16422,675,13577,4494,415,5034,312,2437,7812,1551,223,165,61,14443,377,80],"class_list":["post-14063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-appears","tag-area","tag-bolster","tag-boom","tag-christopher","tag-cites","tag-force","tag-growing","tag-in","tag-increase","tag-luxon","tag-meth","tag-minister","tag-move","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-pacific","tag-pm","tag-police","tag-powers","tag-presence","tag-prime","tag-response","tag-says","tag-security","tag-seen","tag-set","tag-the","tag-their","tag-to","tag-wont","tag-world","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}