Tonga

BELGRADE - Serbian FM Marko Djuric met with Tuvaluan PM Feleti Teo in Belgrade on Thursday, noting that he was pleased Teo's visit was the first bilateral visit to Serbia by a high-ranking Tuvaluan official.

Djuric said Serbia was committed to further strengthen political dialogue and overall cooperation with Tuvalu, the Serbian MFA said in a statement.

This handout photo taken and released on Aug. 26, 2024 by the European Commission shows flags of the Pacific Islands Forum member nations outside the convention centre during the Pacific Islands Forum meeting in Nuku'alofa.

France has agreed terms with Pacific leaders seeking a fact-finding mission to riot-crippled territory New Caledonia, the French ambassador to the Pacific said at a regional summit Thursday.

The 18-nation Pacific Islands Forum, which counts French territory New Caledonia as a member, has been seeking to visit the archipelago in an effort to resolve months of deadly violence.

Pacific Island leaders endorsed a landmark regional policing plan Wednesday at a summit in Tonga, a contentious move seen as an attempt to limit China's security role in the region.

Leaders unveiled a plan to create up to four regional police training centers and a multinational crisis reaction force, backed by $271 million in initial funding from Australia.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres sent out a global climate "SOS" at a Pacific islands summit on Tuesday, unveiling research that shows the region's seas rising much more swiftly than global averages.

"I am in Tonga to issue a global SOS — Save Our Seas — on rising sea levels. A worldwide catastrophe is putting this Pacific paradise in peril" he said.

Emissions-belching nations were challenged to stump up for climate-related damage as a key Pacific islands summit opened on Monday, with low-lying Tuvalu declaring: "If you pollute, you should pay."

The Pacific Islands Forum got underway in Tonga's capital Nuku'alofa, with leaders hoping to draw global attention to the region's worsening climate plight.

A total of 153 countries called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza in a vote at the UN General Assembly.

The resolution demanding an end to hostilities by Israel and the Islamist movement "Hamas" is non-binding. It follows a Security Council vote under a procedure set in motion by the UN secretary-general, in which such a ceasefire text was blocked by the United States.

Gulf oil states are using their vast wealth to build influence across the far-flung South Pacific, experts have told AFP, tearing a page straight out of China's Belt and Road playbook.

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, two of the world's biggest crude oil producers, have been ramping up efforts to shed their reputations as global climate laggards.

Australia's new government has urged China to lift trade sanctions if it wants to reset a bilateral relationship that plumbed new depths under the previous administration.

A Lima zoo is racing to save dozens of seabirds, including protected penguins, left covered in oil after 6,000 barrels of crude spilled off Peru's coast in the aftermath of the Tonga tsunami.