The Australian prime minister has been caught on camera in Tonga joking with a senior US official about going “halvies” on the cost of a newly announced Pacific policing plan .
The deputy secretary of state, Kurt Campbell, appeared to suggest in the video that the US had been planning to pursue an unspecified security-related proposal but had been encouraged by Australia not to proceed.
The video was filmed on Wednesday after the Pacific Islands Forum announced support for the new Pacific policing initiative, which includes a training and coordination hub in Brisbane, Australia.
A multinational rapid-response police unit will be created and four police centres of excellence will be set up in Pacific Island countries, with Australia providing $400m over five years to establish the centres.
The video, posted online by Radio New Zealand, began with Campbell telling Anthony Albanese that the US delegation was travelling to several locations in the Pacific, including Tonga.
The US and China are not Pif members but the two countries are jostling for influence in the region and routinely send high-level delegations to the event for side meetings.
Albanese replied to Campbell: “Well, we had a cracker today getting the Pacific policing initiative through. It is so important, it’ll make such a difference.”
Campbell said the Australia-backed initiative was “fantastic”. The senior US official recounted a conversation he had with “Kevin”, most likely a reference to the Australian ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd.
“I talked with Kevin about it – so you know, we were going to do something and he asked us not to so we did not. We’ve given you the lane, so take the lane!”
Albanese then joked: “Oh, you can go us halvies on the cost if you like.”
The pair shared a laugh. The Australian minister for the Pacific, Pat Conroy, who was standing nearby, then appeared to notice the conversation was being filmed and said: “Come on!”
At a media conference in Tonga on Thursday morning, Albanese was asked whether Campbell would “go you halvies on that policing plan”.
The prime minister laughed and replied: “No, he won’t, because this has come from the Pacific. I’m aware of the video of a private conversation. Kurt Campbell’s a mate of mine, it’s us having a chat.”
Albanese said he was not prepared to give any insight into what initiative Australia had asked the US not to pursue in the region.
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“No,” Albanese told reporters. “It was a jovial conversation, a friendly one. You know, it is what it is. People try and read something into it – you must be pretty bored.”
The notion of the US giving Australia a “lane” in the region is sensitive because at least one Pif member raised concerns this week that the policing initiative was being framed as a geopolitical play to exclude China.
Hours before the deal was announced, the prime minister of Vanuatu, Charlot Salwai, said the region should ensure the plan was “framed to fit our purposes and not developed to suit the geostrategic interests and geostrategic denial security postures of our big partners”.
Asked by a journalist whether there was a sense he had “said the quiet bit out loud”, Albanese said: “What was the quiet bit? It’s a cracker of an announcement. That’s what I said. That’s what I stand by.”
He urged journalists to “chill out”.
Albanese said it was up to the individual who filmed the exchange “to think about their own ethics when it comes to journalism”. He added: “Journalists tend to identify themselves.”
But Mark Stevens, the chief news officer for Radio New Zealand, said the broadcaster “stands by its reporter and its reporting”.
“Having spoken to our reporter, there is nothing to suggest they acted unethically or outside of our rigorous editorial policies,” Stevens said.
Radio New Zealand, in its own report on the exchange , said an RNZ Pacific journalist “was filming cutaways” of Albanese and Campbell after the press conference in which Australia announced the $400m in funding for the policing plan.
“While filming, the pair started discussing policing,” the RNZ report said.
The discussion took place in the main auditorium where Pif talks were held. Journalists with accreditation to cover the event were allowed into the auditorium from time to time for reporting purposes.
Australia has repeatedly registered its concerns about China’s attempts to reach security and policing agreements with Pacific Island countries, including the 2022 deal with Solomon Islands .
But the Australian government has argued the new policing agreement “is about the Pacific family looking after Pacific security” and “isn’t about any other country”.
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