Governments rarely monitor and evaluate their diplomatic outcomes and study lessons learned. That’s strange given the extent to which they evaluate and scrutinise foreign aid spending, defence acquisitions and intelligence-collection efforts. Because so much of …
President Xi Jinping’s attendance at the recent APEC summit in Port Moresby was meant to be the cap on a soft-power charm offensive validating Chinese influence in the Pacific. In the event, it has been …
Images of the leaders of South and North Korea, Moon Jae-in and Kim Jong-un, laughing, smiling and even hugging, are incredibly powerful. They represent the hope that the Korean peninsula is actually entering a new …
With headlines dominated by Canberra’s policy ‘step-up’ in the Pacific in response to China’s rapidly expanding influence in the region, it seems puzzling that the Morrison government would risk disrupting relations with two of its …
Over the past decade, China has taken an increasingly muscular approach to relations with East Asian countries. But in recent months—despite some hiccups in the South Pacific—it has surprised its neighbours with a charm offensive. …
