New patrol boat for Fiji

As the $l4B million Defence Cooperation Pacific Patrol Boat project with Pacific Island Countries nears completion with the han dover of the 20th Pacific Patrol Boat to Fiji on 14 October, the Minister for Defence Science and Personnel, Gary Punch, has assured Pacific Island Countries that Australia’s Defence Cooperation commit ment is on-going.

The $5.5 million RFNS Kiro, is the last of three Patrol Boats for Fiji. The Patrol Boat project was first announced at the 1983 South Pacific Forum.

Recently the project was extended to include the Republic of Palau, which means that 12 Pacific countries have been involved.

The project will eventually encompass 21 vessels, and is the largest undertaken in Australia’s Defence Cooperation program.

In addition almost $122 million has been ploughed into local manufacturing, training and support activities.

“The Pacific Patrol Boat project is one of this Government’s first regional defence ini tiatives which aims to work towards contin ued stability in the South Pacific,” the Minister said at the handover ceremony of

“The project was providing to be both enduring and effective, and it reinforced Australia’s shared interest with Pacific Island countries in

promoting regional

security”

the RFNS Kiro in Fremantle.

The project was providing to be both enduring and effective, and it reinforced Australia’s shared interest with Pacific Island countries in promoting regional security, Punch said.

“In fact, it is a highly successful and practical demonstration of Australia’s com mitment to the South Pacific,” the Minister said.

“Australia recognises that South Pacific nations are both protected, but at the same time made vulnerable, by surrounding

“The Pacific Patrol Boat project has been instrumental in assisting Pacific Forum member nations to protect their sov ereignty and to manage their valuable, but often vulnerable marine resources.

“Our assistance in providing patrol boats in part of a wider cooperative strate gy we are pursuing with Pacific Island nations to enhance maritime surveillance and sovereignty protection,” Punch said.

This strategy had both bilateral and mul tilateral facets.

Australia also maintained its focus on regional maritime information and commu nications systems through the Forum Fisheries Agency.

“We are also actively supporting the establishment of a Vessel Monitoring System for the Agency,” Punch said. The Minister pointed out that there were bene fits for local economies, with the first of the vessels commissioned under the scheme now due for its half-life refit.

“And of the $9OO 000 involved in each of these refits, 85 per cent of the value of the refit goes directly back into the local econ omy through employment of Australian sub-contractors.” ■