Defence Minister Andrew Little recently met with the US National Security Council co-ordinator for the Indo Pacific region.
New Zealanders are being assured talks underway for possible participation in AUKUS would not compromise Aotearoa’s nuclear free status.
The deal – between Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom – is widely seen as a direct response to China’s push for greater regional influence. The trio pitches the security pact as providing “undersea capability that contributes to stability, peace, and prosperity” in the Indo-Pacific and the rest of the world.
But in China’s eyes, the three countries have “gone further down the wrong and dangerous path” and have “totally disregarded the concerns of the international community”.
The first, key, element of AUKUS is a multi-billion dollar deal for Australia to get the technology and capability to deploy nuclear-powered submarines by 2030.
That “sensitivity” was New Zealand’s nuclear free laws, which Defence Minister Andrew Little said would not be in conflict with the parts of AUKUS New Zealand could be involved in.
New Zealand had “been offered the opportunity to talk about whether we could or wish to participate in that pillar-two aspect of it, I’ve indicated we would be willing to explore it and that’s as far as that has gone,” he said.
The security pact was also causing waves in the wider Pacific, with other countries worried the deal goes against the anti-nuclear proliferation Treaty of Rarotonga – to which New Zealand and Australia are both signatories.
Assurances aside, expect it to be on the agenda when Pacific leaders meet in the Cook Islands in October.
Credit: radionz.co.nz
