- By Chen Chih-cheng / Staff reporter
A political commentator and writer in Papua New Guinea (PNG) has criticized the government for favoring Beijing at Taiwan’s expense, raising concerns over the country’s diplomatic autonomy.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Friday last week announced it would close Taiwan’s representative office in PNG and withdraw all personnel, in response to the country’s unilateral and unreasonable demands toward Taiwan.
The move is aimed at safeguarding Taiwan’s national dignity, diplomatic autonomy and national interests, the ministry said.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs logo is pictured in Taipei in an undated photograph.Photo: Taipei Times
PNGBlogs writer Paul L. Kebaija on Sunday in an opinion piece questioned the PNG government’s decisionmaking process. The official statements regarding the decision were inconsistent, lacked transparency and risked sacrificing a top trading partner in exchange for Beijing’s political goodwill, the article said.
PNG Minister of Foreign Affairs Justin Tkatchenko in July announced on Facebook the “immediate cessation of operations” of the Taipei Economic Office under PNG National Executive Council (NEC) Decision No. 144/2026, Kebaija wrote.
A few months later, the PNG ministry said the NEC allowed the Taiwanese office to continue operations for 12 months, then said that the 12-month window is not certain and gave two of the office’s three officials a week to leave the country, he wrote.
“Either the minister misstated a Cabinet decision to the world, or the government is rewriting that decision as it goes,” Kebaija wrote, adding that Taipei said there was no prior consultation.
However, Tkatchenko told foreign media that Taipei had been informed “weeks ago,” and PNG people deserve to know which is true, he wrote.
Taiwan is a long-term key trade partner of PNG, Kebaija wrote, citing Taipei’s statistics saying that about one-third of the country’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports are sold to Taiwan. LNG accounts for more than 40 percent PNG’s total exports, he wrote.
Although Tkatchenko in July said “that [Taiwan’s representative] office doesn’t do anything,” state-owned CPC Corp, Taiwan suspended spot purchases of PNG gas, about 500,000 tonnes, within a fortnight, Kebaija wrote.
Taipei went further in “closing the office, recalling its staff, signing no new spot contracts and ending its technical cooperation, medical missions and scholarships,” he wrote.
PNG released a statement saying that the closure “does not signify an end” to economic and people-to-people ties, which “can be pursued on other platforms,” he wrote, adding that the department should name them.
“The agriculture and fisheries technical missions are ending, the medical missions are ending, and the scholarship programme that had taken around 70 Papua New Guineans to Taiwan by 2022 is ending,” he added.
Kebaija indicated that PNG Prime Minister James Marape said the decision had not been made by pressure from any external power, but the Chinese embassy in PNG called it the “right decision,” while Washington said it was deeply concerned.
“Friends to all, enemies to none” is a foreign policy doctrine that Marape still recites, but in this case, it “turns a top-five trading partner into an aggrieved one for no visible return,” he wrote.
He urged the PNG government to publicize the text of NEC Decision 144/2026, the figure for the gas sales and foreign currency already lost, and the “other platforms” that would replace the scholarships and medical missions.