'Foreign policy views from an Indo Pacific neighbour' Speech on New Zealand foreign policy at the University of Chile, Santiago

Foreign Affairs

Kia ora. Tēnā koutou katoa. And greetings from New Zealand.

Thank you to Rector Devés and the University of Chile for hosting us today, and to Undersecretary de la Fuente and Professor López for the warm welcome and introductions.

When a much younger person, walking on a bridge over an estuary in the east coast of Northland - directly to the west of Chile - one day when the tide was out, my brother and I observed this huge wave coming up the estuary. We wondered what it was - until we found out that there had been an earthquake in Chile and a tsunami had reached our country.

It is a pleasure to be with you today. When we last visited Chile in July 2019, en route to a Pacific Alliance summit in Lima, we met with Foreign Minister Ribera, Agricultural Minister Walker, and of course President Piñera.

We were saddened, and we passed on our condolences to the Piñera family and the people of Chile, when we learnt of his passing on 6 February this year.

Indeed, a lot has changed since that visit, and being in Chile now provides a good opportunity to look at the world as it is today, the interests and values that underpin our foreign policy, and how we respond to the challenges and opportunities in the Indo-Pacific.

But first, I'd like to touch on why I'm here in this prestigious University Hall today.

New Zealand's relationship with Chile

It has been a priority to visit the Republic of Chile this year. As a small country, we understand the value of looking outwards and how critical it is to form regional connections and enduring relationships.

In-person engagements are especially valuable. We have a term: kanohi ki te kanohi - face-to-face - which is much better than Zoom, by phone, or by email.

So, we in our views believe in in-person engagements. We are looking forward to meeting with Minister of the Interior, Carolina Tohá, and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alberto van Klaveren, this afternoon.

Our two countries' relationship is broad and strong, traversing cooperation in the multilateral system to uphold democracy and human rights, our robust business connections, and our engagement in shared trade initiatives and fora such as APEC.

Chile has a long history of democracy. One of the longest in the modern world. We have to reflect sometimes on the history of humanity and the time that democracy has been alive. We want to make sure it stays alive.

Along with New Zealand's Prime Minister, and our Minister for Trade, we will travel to Lima later this week to meet with other APEC Leaders, including from Chile.

We have a long history of working together. Chile established a Consulate in Auckland in the 1870s. That's a long time ago, if you consider our country - established by Polynesians about a thousand years ago, and then the arrival of Europeans in 1800 or sometime around then. And in 1870, Chile established a Consulate in Auckland. At that time, we were two different peoples, but we believed that we should be connected. And Chile has been represented in New Zealand for all that time.

We then established diplomatic relations in 1945 as founding members of the United Nations. We opened embassies in each other's capitals just over fifty years ago.

And some of us were there! Don't get me wrong, I know that in South America age is a very respected thing, but that's not the case everywhere in the world.

Chile is New Zealand's closest neighbour to the east. Our strong people, cultural, and historical links belie the distance that separates us.

Our Māori and Rapa Nui peoples have a strong bond and a history of voyaging across the Pacific.

And we have the same DNA. Marvellous, incredible. All the way across the Pacific to Hawai'i, down the Rapa Nui and all the way down to New Zealand. It doesn´t matter how we got there, but those of us with Māori DNA - by the way I am Māori and Scottish - nevertheless, our Māori background connects us with the Rapa Nui people. So we are not strangers, and we shouldn't be.

State of the world and our region

The world faces a myriad of challenges.

There are multiple, intersecting, and mutually reinforcing crises of conflict, climate change, the rolling back of democracy, restrictive market access barriers, and increasingly, a crisis of trust in our institutions.

The world has changed, and so must we. Diplomacy, relationships, and the tools of statecraft matter more than ever in our troubled world.

New Zealand sees these challenges as representing three big shifts in the international order:

• From rules to power,
• From economics to security
• And from efficiency to resilience

Across the world there are cases where the liberal rules-based system on which our two countries so heavily depend is under direct threat.

The values we have strongly fought for are disregarded by Russia in its illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

We are concerned by North Korea, Iran, and those others supporting its military industries to fuel its ongoing war against Ukraine either directly, or indirectly through their export of dual-use technologies supplying military-related technologies to Russia.

Both New Zealand and Chile continue to support Ukraine. New Zealand through its sanctions on Russia, humanitarian assistance, and military support for Ukraine, and Chile through the provision of humanitarian assistance.

It's important we consider the misery caused by both Hamas and its monstrous terrorist attacks last year and the overwhelming sad and appalling ongoing nature of Israel's response.

It was an act of absolute terrorism but there was a time, and the response is just too much - too much suffering and humanity is what the world is being asked to consider, and we are countries that have to do that.

The situation in Gaza is deeply distressing and New Zealand has been clear that this conflict must end.

Regional conflict would have disastrous consequences for the Middle East.

Both New Zealand and Chile have called for restraint, the protection of civilian lives, and the upholding of international humanitarian law by all parties.

As home to the largest Palestinian community outside of the Middle East, we know this issue is very close to home for you here in Chile. We acknowledge Chile's leadership on the utter catastrophe unfolding in the Middle East and in the multilateral system as well.

Closer to home, we face the threat of North Korea's evolving nuclear capability and ambition.

We are concerned about tensions in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait.

New Zealand and Chile are both trade-dependent nations who rely on free and safe navigation for global shipping transiting the South China Sea in particular.

Militarisation and use of force to pursue sovereignty claims puts this at risk. Especially when it is utterly contrary to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

We continue to call on all claimants to refrain from actions which risk escalating tensions, or which undermine the trust and confidence that is needed to achieve an enduring solution, and to resolve disputes peacefully in accordance with the Law of the Sea.

China is New Zealand's largest trading partner by a significant margin, as it is also for Chile.

As China's power and influence have increased, so too have the areas of difference that we have had to negotiate and navigate. We do this by cooperating where our interests align, and by protecting our interests and speaking up where they diverge.

We continue to see democracy and human rights moving backwards in some places. New Zealand appreciates the leadership of Chile on the crisis in Venezuela.

For some of you young people that think politics don't matter - pay a good hard look at Venezuela and tell me that it's not so - politics does matter.

Like Chile, we remain committed to promoting credibility, legitimacy, and a transparent electoral process that respects the will of the Venezuelan people, its voters and upholds democracy.

These principles are non-negotiable. We were pleased to be able to join Chile and other countries in the Joint Declaration on Venezuela in August.

In New Zealand's home region, the Blue Pacific, we are seeing more sustained geostrategic challenges than at any time during the past 80 years.

The Pacific region's strategic environment is not benign, far from it. The Blue Pacific is increasingly becoming a theatre for strategic competition.

In 2018 Pacific Islands Forum Leaders recognised climate change as the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security, and well-being of the Pacific peoples. Geostrategic challenges risk distracting from this key Pacific priority.

New Zealand's foreign policy response

Today, alongside reflecting on the state of the world, let's also discuss how New Zealand acts and responds to this through its foreign policy. The shifting ground presents challenges. But we also see great chances.

We see our strategic and our economic interests as most acutely engaged in the Indo-Pacific. New Zealand is lifting our diplomatic effort in the region. New Zealand is deeply committed to supporting the continued prosperity, security, and stability of the Indo-Pacific region.

New Zealand is committed to ASEAN centrality and the ASEAN regional architecture that has played such an integral role in the stability and security of the Indo-Pacific.

Our approach to the Indo-Pacific is centred on working together with others - both bilaterally and through the regional architecture - to support the rules, norms, and institutions that have underpinned the region's success, in the face of increasing challenge.

These include respect for the liberal rules-based system; sovereignty; constraints on the unilateral use of force; and a region that is open, transparent, and inclusive.

New Zealand works to bring together those that share a genuine commitment to resolving the challenges we face.

New Zealand's ambition is for a peaceful, stable, prosperous, and resilient Pacific.

The Pacific Islands Forum is the region's pre-eminent organisation, and the Pacific Islands Forum community recognises that the Blue Pacific reaches across to Rapa Nui and Latin American Pacific-facing neighbours. We recognise that it includes you.

Chile is unique as the only country in Latin America that is a Forum Dialogue Partner. Not bad. Is a Forum Dialogue Partner of us 18, and member of the South Pacific Defence Ministers' Meeting. This wider community can play a role in ensuring the prosperity and security of the region.

It is essential that engagement in the Pacific takes place in a manner which advances Pacific countries' priorities, is consistent with established regional practices, listens and works with Pacific countries and is supportive of Pacific regional institutions.

Smaller nations like ours face many of the same challenges and share the same concerns. Our work together multilaterally, in regional fora, and with other like-minded partners helps to establish steadying rules for our region.

We find ourselves in the same rooms and orienting ourselves to the same groupings, including some that have just been mentioned: the Pacific Islands Forum - where Chile is a Dialogue Partner; ASEAN - where Chile is a Development Partner; and the South Pacific Defence Ministers' Meeting which was held in Auckland last month and will be hosted by Chile next year. Next year, Chile will be hosting this very important Dialogue. So, we are working together, real hard, right here, right now.

New Zealand has the goal of effecting a serious step change in export value over the next decade through active economic diplomacy.

Our relationship with Chile, through our long history of cooperation in the trade space, will help us to achieve this.

Our work in CPTPP, which Chile and New Zealand originally pioneered with Singapore and Brunei in the P4, is key to supporting our economic prosperity.

We've had some serious successes. In late 2017, we went all the way to Viet Nam and put together the CPTPP - not bad for small countries - in which we've been major players.

We are also jointly founding members of the Digital Economic Partnership Agreement.

In this vein, we appreciate Chile's support for New Zealand's interest in Associate Member status of the Pacific Alliance - Chile, Peru, Colombia, Mexico - negotiated through a free trade agreement with the bloc.

We see this free trade agreement as an opportunity to deepen our strategic, as well as our economic, ties to the region.

Globally, New Zealand works with Chile:

• To support reform of the UN Security Council, including our shared opposition to the use or, rather, the misuse of the veto;
• In climate change focused forums like the UNFCCC to ensure their effectiveness, which is vital to global efforts to reduce the impacts of climate change; and
• On Antarctic issues, where upholding the Antarctic Treaty System is more important than ever to maintain the region as a natural reserve for peace, science, and cooperation.

New Zealand and Chile consistently work together, and act based on our values - the more we continue to do so, the better for our region.

In that vein, diplomacy matters. At this moment in time the ability to talk with, rather than at, each other has never been more necessary.

From understanding comes chance and from diplomacy comes compromise, the building block of better relations between countries, nations and peoples.

We need more diplomacy and more engagement. And we know that in Chile that we have a partner that fundamentally understands this and gets it.

Conclusion

New Zealand and Chile look upon our region from either side of the same ocean, we are thousands and thousands of kilometres apart. But we see things so much alike. Maybe it is because there is no country in between us, with all that distance.

But we do not think of the Pacific as separating us; rather, it is a bridge that connects us.

In fact, at either end of this ocean, there are cultural signs that symbolise this connection - a small Moai at Lyall Bay on Wellington's south coast, and a wooden pou or pillar at the Gabriela Mistral Cultural Centre here in Santiago. I hope you get a chance to see both while you're on this earth.

We must act in our region with those who share our values and who think values are worth defending, so that all are free to forge their own futures in their own way.

We are natural partners when navigating regional and global challenges, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region. And we look forward to continuing to build on this partnership in the years to come.

Lastly, as a young boy milking cows, in a cowshed which we are very famous for - and so are you people here - I can remember hearing this marvellous song that talked about faraway places with strange-sounding names - oh how I'd love to go there some day.

I'm pleased to be in Chile and to be amongst you. Thank you very, very much.