The New Australia-Papua New Guinea Defense Pact: Strategic Realism and Power Diplomacy
Papua New Guinean (left) and Australian (right) prime ministers (left) sign a mutual defense treaty on October 6, 2025. Source: International Committee of the Fourth International.
On October 6, 2025, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his Papua New Guinea counterpart, James Marape, signed a major bilateral treaty forming a defense partnership between both parties. The Papua New Guinea (PNG) – Australia Mutual Defence Treaty (also known as The Pukpuk Treaty) marks the first alliance-level security pact for Australia since the 1950s, and the first such treaty for Papua New Guinea. The agreement signals a strategic shift by PNG to balance Western opportunities with Asian guarantees, underscoring the broader geopolitical stakes unfolding across the Pacific Islands.
The significance of the treaty reaches beyond the borders of PNG; geopolitical contests have long evolved in the Pacific Islands since they are naturally endowed with valuable resources such as timber, fisheries, and critical minerals. This has created international competition for economic resources, as exemplified by China’s secured agreement on deep-sea mining in the Cook Islands. Extending beyond economic strategy, however, the countries hold strategic importance in security and defence, considering their location between the U.S., China, and Australia. Geopolitical competition in the Pacific has intensified with both China and the U.S and its Pacific allies attempting to exert military influence over the islands.
China has been tightening its influence in the region through increased economic assistance and political diplomacy cooperation. From 2013 to 2023, Chinese investment in Australasia and the South Pacific reached 80.78 billion USD, targeting 19 ports in PNG, Fiji, Samoa, and Solomon Islands. Though Beijing asserts the aids come with ‘no political strings attached,’ defence and police engagement with the Solomon Islands increased by approximately 550 percent after the 2022 Solomon Islands Security Agreement. The agreement initiated the deployment of Chinese armed police, military, and law enforcement personnel to the islands, paving the way for China’s recent further strengthening of regional security. China has attempted to export its village surveillance model to the Solomon Islands, reinvigorating the ‘‘Fengqiao’’ model to ensure stability in local communities in September 2025. As a surveillance system designed to curb social unrest by piloting fingerprint and data collection, the model raised complex human rights concerns due to its extensive monitoring. It has triggered intense reaction from Western countries, from investment races to military upgrades. Immediately following the reported surveillance, the U.S. Department of State published its reinvigoration of the U.S.-Pacific Islands Partnership in Papua New Guinea, strengthening security and force posture under the two countries’ multi-sector framework for strategic cooperation. Turning back to PNG, the critical moment has come for its political diplomacy, as it seeks to balance dynamics with both China and the Western allies.
As Marape said earlier in 2023, ‘‘We keep them [China] in the space of the economy, we went with traditional security partners for security.” PNG has maintained a nuanced strategic balance by deepening its economic ties with China while also expanding security and defense relationships with Western-aligned countries, showing its firm determination to implement its “Friends to All, Enemies to None’’ foreign policy. This is vividly shown as the country had shelved its bilateral police agreement with China in 2024 after lobbying by Australia, turning to the U.S. for a $864 million defense deal instead. Still, such a move doesn’t deter PNG from strengthening trade, economic, and infrastructural development with China during the countries’ prime minister meeting in 2025. With Australia having an important role in BNG’s national security, given its close geographic proximity, its assistance to the country’s defense wouldn’t be considered surprising. Instead, it represents clever political leveraging by PNG, which extends its support system with the Western allies while still remaining on good economic terms with China. Such a persistent aim to balance relationships with both eastern and western hemispheres raises the stakes in the Pacific region, intensifying power battles by both sides. Recently negotiated treaties, as exemplified by the Pukpuk Treaty, serve as a case in point of how domestic diplomacy can generate global influences extending far beyond initial national interests.
The new treaty undoubtedly raised alarms for China, as the Chinese Embassy in PNG stated the bilateral pact ‘‘should not restrict or prevent a sovereign country from cooperating with a third party for any reason.’’ The statement illustrates how the political implications of the treaty extend well beyond regional security. For Australia, the act has been an almost direct countering of growing Chinese influence in the Pacific. As a strengthened continuation of the 2024 Australia-Papua New Guinea Bilateral Security Agreement, the act allows up to 10,000 Papua New Guineans to serve with the Australian Defense Force. This has been a considerable step-up from the initial $200 million funding from Australia to PNG supporting regional police, courts, and correctional services provided in 2023.
As such, the treaty reveals Australia’s strategic attempts to maintain its influence in a region where China is increasing its presence. At the same time, Australia continues to uphold its‘‘Pacific family’’ diplomacy by strengthening collective regional security to shield against common challenges. As Papua New Guinea continues to balance its strategic interests with both hemispheres of the global order, the question of collective security under counteracting power dynamics remains.