8 Dec 2014

Australia renews military ties with Fiji

12:12 pm on 8 December 2014

The Vice Chief of the Australian defence force, Vice Admiral Ray Grigg, is due in Fiji today to renew ties with the Fiji military.

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Photo: AFP

This comes a month after Fiji agreed to resume full diplomatic ties with Canberra and accredit Australia's High Commissioner, who had been nominated two years earlier.

The relationship between the two countries soured in the month before the 2006 coup when Fiji's military warned Australia not to think about invading Fiji.

After the coup, Australia unsuccessfully lobbied the United Nations against hiring soldiers from Fiji, but Australia changed its position again in 2011.

In 2007, the Fiji Human Rights Commission alleged that Australia had breached international law through its military activities, repeating claims by the Fiji military that before the coup Australia secretly sent SAS soldiers and weapons to Fiji and its navy ships entered Fiji waters in preparation for a potential intervention.

Australia rejected the claims.

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