After Five Decades, It Comes To This: The PNG-Australia Pukpuk Treaty

Opinion – Binoy Kampmark

With each utterance on sovereignty from Canberra, officials in Port Moresby would do well to consider the implications of the pact. PNG may have existed as a nominally independent state for fifty years, but that independence is set to come to an end.

It’s clearer than ever: the Albanese government is continuing its efforts to shut out China in wooing and seducing island states across vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean. Bilateral security treaties are being pursued as a matter of urgency. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has, for instance, stated that he is open to closer defence ties with Fiji, which “could range from increased interoperability, the sort of training that we are seeing with the Pacific Policing Initiative, being expanded to increased engagement between our defence forces”.

The template, however, would seem to be the Pukpuk Treaty between Australia and Papua New Guinea (pukpuk being the pidgin word for “crocodile”). It was reported on September 15 that the PNG cabinet had, despite a few procedural hiccups, approved the pact, with a PNG cabinet submission observing that the treaty is intended “to prepare our militaries to be battle-ready and for a very bad day”. With exaggeration, the document also envisages a treaty with the bite of a crocodile in linking the militaries of the two countries.

While the contents of the treaty have yet to be published – the Albanese government is showing itself increasingly secretive – the Australian national broadcaster has seen a copy. There are also clues about what is expected. PNG Defence Minister Billy Joseph has said that a provision much like Article 4 in NATO’s founding treaty, obliging member states to consult when any one feels a threat to their territorial integrity, political independence or security, is in the offing. The existing 1977 Status of Forces framework will be modernised to include a mutual defence obligation, a hefty expenditure on weapons and equipment for PNG while permitting unimpeded access of Australian Defence Forces to facilities in PNG. PNG nationals will also be able to be recruited into the ADF, as will Australians wishing to be recruited into the PNG Defence Forces.

Despite celebrating five decades of independence, PNG has decided to throw a good bit of it away by surrendering the complete autonomy of its armed forces to Australian influence and control. Such arrangements are always advertised as ostensible exercises of “interoperability”, consultation and equality, with various domestic processes needing to be observed. In truth, this gives Canberra greater say over what Port Moresby will do with its armed forces and, by implication, its foreign policy.

Such greater say also risks involving Australia in a range of security concerns. Don Rothwell, an international law authority based at the Australian National University, sees the prospect of Canberra being snagged in PNG-Indonesia border issues arising from West Papua, and dirtying itself with “an active independence movement in Bougainville, which raises issues of PNG’s ‘political independence or security’.”

With the attraction of a pathway to Australian citizenship and the prospect of equal rates of pay as earned by members of the ADF, there is a genuine chance that PNG will see its own forces depleted while swelling the ranks of the ADF. In terms of planning, this looks like a fantastic instance of self-harm and diminishment.

International relations commentary rarely does a good line in ironic reflection. A piece in The Conversation by Ian Kemish does not disappoint, flecked with platitudes on “deep roots in shared history”, Australia being the “most trusted partner” to PNG, and sentimental guff about “partnership and equality”. Port Moresby had evidently felt that the relationship with Canberra was “unique – the only one that combines proximity, capability and an enduring sense of shared history.” Michael Shoebridge of the Strategic Analysis Australia think tank, described the pact as “a pretty big step”, with PNG saying “‘Yes we agree, you actually are our security partner of choice, and we mean it enough to put it into a treaty’.”

Australian self-interest, ever jittery about China’s regional influence, shines so brightly in these arrangements as to make such remarks feeble. Australian Defence Minister Richard Marles, often circuitous and waffly at press conferences, was candid in admitting that “PNG is obviously on our northern flank. It really matters that we have the very best relationship we have with PNG in a security sense. And I’m really excited about the fact that this agreement is going to give expression to that.”

The need to keep PNG close to Australia’s military interests is also of ongoing interest to such anti-China hawks as the sacked and disgraced former secretary of the Department of Home Affairs, Mike Pezzullo. For some reason, press outlets think his predictable views matter. To The Australian Financial Review, he explained rather banally that “PNG would be in peril were it to be attacked by a foreign power.” He advised that Australia “for the first time in our bilateral relationship, commit to coming to PNG’s assistance in the event of it being attacked by a foreign power.” Any agreement that did not codify such an undertaking “would be, while useful, not reflective of our deep strategic interdependence.”

With each utterance on sovereignty from Canberra, officials in Port Moresby would do well to consider the implications of the pact. PNG may have existed as a nominally independent state for fifty years, but that independence is set to come to an end.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. Email: bkampmark@gmail.com

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