Discussions on climate actions and combating illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing were held by Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama and the State Councilor and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, Wang Yi.
This was highlighted by Bainimarama while speaking in a joint press statement that was held at the Grand Pacific Hotel.
Bainimarama says their meeting was guided by mutual respect and the common interest of the people’s continued social and economic progress.
He says as a global community, we remain woefully short of cutting emissions in line with the 1.5 degree Celsius target of the Paris Agreement.
He adds that he will continue to push for a phase-out of coal and other fossil fuels by all economies as quickly and practically as possible.
The Prime Minister says they also discussed how to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.
He says China is a forum dialogue partner in the Pacific Islands Forum and is also an important bilateral partner to the ten Pacific Countries that met.
Bainimarama says the challenges the people face will only intensify until collective solutions rise to meet them.
He also urged the media who intensely covered this visit to rise above the political punditry and put a focus on how we could solve these challenges together.
The Prime Minister says that geopolitical points-scoring means less than little to anyone whose community is slipping beneath the rising seas and whose job has been lost to the pandemic or whose family is impacted by the rapid rise in the price of commodities.
No questions were allowed after the joint statement.
