Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD: Fiji’s newly elected Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka has announced scrapping a 2011-signed security pact with China.
“There’s no need for us to continue, our systems are different,” said Rabuka, head of the island nation’s coalition government.
Pact allowed Fijian police to get trained in China
The agreement signed by the Fiji Police Force and China’s Ministry of Public Security allows Fijian police officers to receive training in China, while also deploying Chinese officers to Fiji “on attachment programs for three to six months,” the Fiji Times reported.
The cooperation was further elevated in September 2021, when a Chinese Police Liaison officer was deployed in the South Pacific country.
“Our system of democracy and justice are different so we will go back to those having a similar system with ours,” said Rabuka, head of the People’s Alliance Party.
Rabuka, 74, who was the instigator of two military coups in 1987 and also served as prime minister from 1992 to 1999 once again took office on December 24, 2022 after forming an alliance with two other parties, following his one-vote victory over his predecessor Frank Bainimarama in the prime ministerial election.
