Fijian prime minister Sitiveni Rabuka shakes hands with Christopher Luxon. Photo: RNZ / Giles Dexter
New Zealand appears to be gearing up to offer more policing support in the Pacific, as the prime minister heads to a retreat with other Pacific leaders.
Christopher Luxon and fellow Pacific Islands Forum leaders will spend the day at the Solomon Islands settlement of Munda, around an hour's flight away from the capital Honiara.
There, leaders will be free to discuss matters without officials, or media, present.
It is a more relaxed affair than the plenary sessions, which took place in a large sports hall in the capital.
On the sidelines, Christopher Luxon held bilateral meetings with fellow Pacific leaders.
In addition to efforts to bolster trade, Luxon and Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka's bilateral was focused on law and order collaboration.
A surge in methamphetamine use and trafficking was something Luxon said the whole region was grappling with.
"It's something that I floated probably a few months ago, to say, look, we have a Pacific Policing Initiative. We all have challenges around meth consumption, as we know, in New Zealand. And actually, we've got to protect our borders across the Pacific," he said.
The Australia-led Pacific Policing Initiative intends to establish regional training centres and deploy police response teams throughout the Pacific during times of civil unrest, natural disasters, or major events.
It was deployed at the CHOGM summit in Samoa last year, as leaders from every Commonwealth state converged in once place.
Luxon said United States-based organised crime groups and Mexican cartels were making inroads in the Pacific, and Pacific nations needed to co-ordinate to push back against it.
He said he was more than happy to put New Zealand boots on the ground to help.
"We should work and use the Pacific Policing Initiative, collaborate with our fellow partners around the region, and if we need to put more assets into the region, that's a good thing."
Leaders also signed an Ocean of Peace declaration at the summit.
Speaking to RNZ ahead of the summit, Pacific historian Marco de Jong questioned whether New Zealand and Australia would use the Ocean of Peace as a "chapeau" for an "alternative regional security framework", seeking to align the region with broader geostrategic initiatives - namely the US-China rivalry.
He said there was a parallel security architecture, comprising initiatives like the Pacific Policing Initiative, emerging outside of the Forum's auspices.
But Luxon dismissed a notion that China may look at the initiative as a way of asserting dominance and control, saying there was broad sign-up from PIF members.
"From a leader-to-leader point of view, and from a country-to-country point of view, we're very aligned that we've got a common approach to policing. But actually we also need not just the mechanism of collaborating and working together and joint training and all that good stuff," he said.
"We actually need to go to work and actually work out how we're going to push back on transnational organised crime, because the resources coming out of the cartels and out of organised crime are massive, and that's why we've got to coordinate better."
Luxon also met with the leaders of Palau and Kiribati.
Christopher Luxon shakes hands with Kiribati president Taneti Maamau. Photo: RNZ / Giles Dexter
Earlier this year, New Zealand and Kiribati were locked in a diplomatic stoush over a perceived snub.
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said New Zealand would review its funding to Kiribati, after its president and foreign minister cancelled a meeting with him - a claim Kiribati denies.
Kiribati remains the only Pacific nation Peters is yet to visit.
In the end, there was no pause to funding.
On Wednesday evening, Luxon and Kiribati President Taneti Maamau sat down together. While the two posed for photos with media, unusually they offered no opening remarks.
Luxon said it was the first time he had met with Maamau, and left the diplomatic matters for officials to work through.
"That doesn't preclude us having a civil relationship at a leader level as well. It's quite possible to do both things, to have the officials work through the details of what we need to get right going forward, but equally, to be able to build the relationship, a personal relationship."
He expected Peters would have a chance to meet with Maamau when they are both at the United Nations General Assembly in New York later this month.
On Wednesday night, leaders ratified the Pacific Resilience Facility, a financial institution to aid Pacific nations with climate resilience and adaptation.
New Zealand initially wanted a better idea of how it would be run, before committing any money. It eventually put $20 million to the fund.
Australia contributed $100m, but Luxon said to look at the size of their respective economies.
The goal for the fund is US$500m.
Luxon said there was no plan for New Zealand to put more in at this stage, and efforts would be focused on attracting other donors.
He also met with Palau's president Surangel Whipps Jr.
Palau will host the 2026 Forum, where it is expected dialogue partners will once again be invited to attend.
While much was made in the buildup over the Solomon Islands' decision to bar PIF dialogue and development partners, Luxon said it was not a focus on Wednesday.
"There might be differences of opinion, but it's not a show stopper, and it's not the major conversation, to be honest," he said.
He expected it would be discussed at the retreat, as PIF leaders plot a path forwards on how it engaged with those partners.
Luxon also confirmed New Zealand will host the 2027 Forum.
He sat down with the president of Palau, which is hosting the 2026 Forum, on Wednesday night to discuss how to work together as part of the Troika for the next forum.
The Troika is the Forum's high-level consultation mechanism, consisting of the existing chair, the outgoing chair, and the incoming chair.
Luxon said it would be a "great honour" to host, but as he prepared to head to this year's retreat, he said he had not given any thought as to where New Zealand's be hosted.
"We're so blessed, but no we haven't got that far yet. But we've got some amazing facilities coming on stream with convention centres across the country. There's a number of places we could do it."
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