Pacific Island Leaders will be gathering at the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) in Suva today- as they prepare for the 10th Pacific Island Leaders Meeting (PALM10) in Tokyo, Japan, later in July.
The Interim Meeting will see the partnership and implementation of the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent (2050 Strategy) and is a follow-up on previous PALM commitments.
In a statement, PIF said the 5th PALM Ministerial Interim Meeting will be a historic event as it comes to the Pacific for the first time.
Secretary-General Henry Puna said the Japan-Pacific Island Forum Leaders Meeting has come to symbolise a level of mutual respect and dialogue as the way to deepen progress towards common ground, as a collective, between our sea of islands and global development partners.
Puna said that: “With the recent Pacific Partnership for Prosperity launch from leaders meeting in Rarotonga, to the next steps for the 2050 Implementation Plan, I see that this Interim Meeting will play an integral part in framing the first face to face PALM since 2018.
The Government of Japan is represented and led by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Hon. Yoko Kamikawa, who also plans to visit Samoa this week.
Delegations from Australia, Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, French Polynesia, Kiribati, Nauru, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Republic of the Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu have begun to arrive in Suva for the meeting.
