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Vulnerable in the South Pacific - Nations & States - Global Policy Forum Vulnerable in the South Pacific
By Gerard A. Finin
International Herald Tribune
January 29, 2002
Global efforts to tighten security since Sept. 11 have largely missed the 14 Pacific island nations. These are widely scattered, with extensive maritime zones that span nearly a third of the globe. Terrorists, of course, commonly seek to exploit any vulnerability they can find to achieve their objectives. Countries like Fiji and Vanuatu may seem like tourist havens in a tropical paradise, but there is an urgent need for the international community to ensure that Pacific island states do not become havens from which future terrorist attacks are planned, financed or launched. Israel's recent seizure of a gunrunning ship sailing under the flag of Tonga exemplifies how Pacific island nations are very much linked to contemporary global events. A coalition against terrorism should include them.
In World War II, the United States fought together with the peoples of the Pacific islands to establish control over harbors and airfields where enemy troops were within striking distance of Allied powers. In the Cold War, the United States and its allies engaged the Pacific island nations through a policy of strategic denial that successfully thwarted efforts by the Soviet Union to establish a naval presence. Since the Cold War, the United States has not discerned clear national interests in remaining engaged in the Pacific. Enhanced long-distance air and sea capabilities no longer make plane refueling and ship resupply in the islands necessary. The demise of the Soviet navy, coupled with pressures to do more in other areas of the world, has resulted in a major downgrading of U.S. relations with the South Pacific.
American diplomatic and consular offices have closed. People-to-people programs such as Fulbright academic exchanges and Humphrey scholarships have been abandoned. The Bush administration, without consulting South Pacific governments, unilaterally stepped back from the Kyoto protocols to reduce global warming and ocean rise that threaten atoll nations.
Development aid declined while pressures to become more economically self-sufficient increased. So island states attempted to raise revenues by new means. Some of these endeavors, along with other more general problems of governance, now form a significant weak link in the war on terrorism. Aware of the high price that individuals would pay to gain citizenship that facilitates international travel, some island nations established special programs that essentially sell passports on demand.
Equally problematic for international efforts to stem terrorism is the existence of offshore banking operations in several Pacific island states. This critically important source of income for certain governments has the potential to hide huge sums from scrutiny. Nauru, for example, is reportedly home to some 450 shell banking companies, of which one-third are said to be of Middle Eastern origin. An estimated $400 million passes through these accounts each year. The United States, Japan, Australia and New Zealand should encourage anti-money-laundering reforms by helping small island states to develop other sources of revenue.
With hundreds of remote islands and porous national maritime borders extending thousands of miles, it is difficult to maintain oversight and strict enforcement of immigration rules. Scrutiny of arriving and departing visitors and cargo may at best be haphazard. Airline security tends to be minimal in locations that lack adequate communication and security equipment.
The Bush administration should move quickly to renew old U.S.-South Pacific friendships so as to advance collective security.
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