The federal government is pressing Beijing to respect the Pacific's decisions on Taiwan after Chinese officials hauled in Pacific ambassadors to again complain about Taipei's participation in the region's most important annual summit.
Pacific leaders last month reaffirmed that Taiwan could continue to meet with its three remaining diplomatic partners on the sidelines of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) leaders meeting — resisting a push from Beijing to exclude it entirely from the high-profile event.
China has not publicly criticised the communique, unlike during last year's meeting in Tonga, when its top Pacific diplomat demanded PIF retract a section backing Taiwan's continued presence.
But an Australian government figure, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Beijing was still "very unhappy" with the PIF outcome, and that Pacific nations had faced some "heat" from Beijing in the wake of the meeting.
The ABC has also been told that Tang Zhiwen — the Deputy Director of the Department of North American and Oceanian Affairs in China's foreign ministry — called in several Beijing-based ambassadors from Pacific nations in the wake of last month's meeting, saying it risked damaging China-Pacific ties.
A source familiar with the meeting said Tang Zhiwen had made his points "very forcefully", but that Pacific nations were "not surprised" by the response because Taiwan was such a sensitive issue for Beijing.
Both Australia and New Zealand are also full PIF members and endorsed the most recent communique, but China does not seem to have summoned diplomats from either country to the meeting with Pacific diplomats — with the foreign ministry instead lodging separate complaints in Wellington and Canberra.
The ABC approached the Chinese Embassy in Canberra for comment on Thursday, but it was yet to respond.
Australia and New Zealand back PIF
Both New Zealand and Australia are showing increasingly public signs of frustration about the way China has heaped pressure on Pacific nations over Taiwan, arguing that it risked splintering PIF unity, and distracting the region from critical development challenges.
New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters took a thinly veiled swipe at China when Solomon Islands decided to exclude all partners from this year's PIF leaders meeting, saying "outsiders" were determining who the Pacific could invite as guests.
A spokesperson for New Zealand's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade would not say exactly when or where China lodged its complaints over this year's communique, but suggested Beijing had no right to remonstrate with Pacific nations over Taiwan.
"Forum communiques are an internal matter for Pacific Islands Forum leaders, and this year's communique has been agreed to and issued by leaders," they said.
"New Zealand has been consistent in its position that long-standing Pacific Islands Forum procedures should be upheld, including the 1992 consensus on Taiwan's participation and the reaffirmation of this consensus in subsequent forum communiques."
The spokesperson also said New Zealand had "been clear with all of our international partners that it is important that engagement in the Pacific takes place in a manner which advances Pacific priorities, is consistent with established regional practices, and supportive of Pacific regional institutions."
A spokesperson for Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade also did not provide any details about the diplomatic complaints China had lodged.
But they also delivered a clear message to Beijing, saying Australia "encourages China to engage with the PIF and its members in a manner that promotes regional unity".
"This includes working through and respecting regional institutions and norms, including the PIF's decisions with respect to engaging Taiwan," they said.
"Australia has made its position clear, including directly to China."
Taiwan a priority
Analyst Jessica Marinaccio, who has worked as an academic and as an advisor to the government of Tuvalu, told the ABC that China's response to the Solomon Islands communique was not surprising.
"For China, the sensitivities and long history of the Taiwan issue may supersede considerations of maintaining a positive diplomatic reputation in the Pacific," she said.
"For China, Taiwan is not a negotiable issue."
But she also said that China's forceful diplomacy on the issue could undermine Beijing's position and consolidate Taiwan's — as long as Taipei continued to hold on to its remaining diplomatic allies in the region.
"I think there is a clear feeling that if Taiwan is fully rejected from PIF while it still has allies in the Pacific, this could threaten PIF unity similar to what we saw in 2021 when the Micronesian countries withdrew from the forum," she said.
"When there is pressure to exclude Taiwan from its usual role at PIF leaders meetings, PIF members have to decide whether they care more about keeping PIF together or tending to their bilateral relations with China.
"And as we saw this year, there is more interest in keeping PIF together."
