NGOs question Fiji's exclusion from Pacific trade talks

Linda Mottram, with agencies

Last Updated: Thu, 22 Oct 2009 15:56:00 +1100

Pacific trade ministers will meet in the Australian city of Brisbane this week for the formal start of negotiations on a regional free trade agreement known as PACER-Plus.

It is the start of a process that could take as long as five years, though Australia is keen to move faster.

The first meeting will discuss a possible time frame and practical issues of how to proceed.

Fiji will not take part, remaining isolated from regional forums for refusing to return to democracy more quickly.

Questioning Australia's intent

A range of regional non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are extremely cautious about PACER-Plus, accusing Australia of a self-interested push and warning a deal could be impossibly skewed against the Pacific's far smaller economies.

Australia flatly denies such claims while some Pacific leaders have rejected claims they've been squeezed by Australia to start the talks.

The NGOs have also argued leaving Fiji out of the talks is illegal, since Fiji was a signatory to the original PACER-Plus document.

The group of negotiating countries are facing renewed calls to allow Fiji back into the negotiations.

Fiji hits back

Meanwhile, Fiji's military leader, Commodore Frank Bainimarama, has hit back at comments made about the state of his nation's economy.

Professor Ron Duncan from the Australian National University says Fiji's economy is in a terrible state and the only remaining income, in the wake of the military coup, comes from the country's struggling tourism industry.

Professor Ron Duncan presented a paper on Fiji to the Lowy Institute for International Policy, in Sydney, which has released its 2009 Pacific Islands Update report.

In a statement Commodore Bainimarama continued to blame the global financial crisis and the floods in Fiji in January for the state of the economy.

He says Professor Duncan's comments on Fiji were ill informed.