Should Australia worry about Chinese expansion in the South Pacific? (Feng Zhang, ASPI The Strategist)

A major international conference on the Pacific Islands was held recently by the Centre for Pacific Island Countries Studies in Guangzhou, the capital city of China’s Guangdong province. The conference, devoted solely to a discussion of the Pacific Islands, was the first of its kind in China. The Centre was authorised by the highest level of the central leadership in Beijing and supported by the Guangdong provincial government. That China has appointed a special envoy for the Pacific Islands, and that the envoy, Ambassador Du Qiwen, attended a full-day conference—a true rarity for Chinese officials—only attests to the growing attention China is paying to the Pacific Islands region.

http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/australia-worry-chinese-expansion-south-pacific/