APEC host Papua New Guinea doesn't need cheap cash and hollow promises, it needs a genuine solution

Christian Edwards, provided by Business Insider, ctpost.com

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Excerpt:

A mini Pacific Game of Thrones will be going down this weekend as Papua New Guinea plays host to 21 nations at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Port Moresby.

Australia and China in particular will be vying for influence and they already have the checkbooks out.

China's President Xi Jinping is already on the ground in Papua New Guinea for a state visit.

But Bridi Rice, the Director of Policy and Advocacy at the Australian Council of International Development and a former Australian government anti-money-laundering adviser to Papua New Guinea says the country needs genuine partners, not handouts. ...

According to Rice, also a current La Trobe University research candidate on Australia’s aid program in Papua New Guinea, inclusive infrastructure investment may be welcome, but other reactive expenditure on short-term public diplomacy [JB emphasis] is simply ineffective.

Such efforts in an attempt to increase Australia’s profile and influence in the region come to nothing, when the have no long-term benefits."

"(New infrastructure investment) should not come at the cost of what we know works — that is — long-term relationships, deep cultural understanding, and development cooperation which works primarily in the interests of the countries where Australia works,” Rice told Business Insider. ...