Academic warns Aust approach could foster Pacific instability

A former New Zealand diplomat says a new Australian foreign affairs white paper could foster instability in the Pacific.

The paper, released late last year, outlines plans to integrate Pacific countries into the Australia and New Zealand economies and their security institutions.

But Michael Powles, who is a senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic Studies at Victoria University in Wellington, suggested to Don Wiseman that this could amount to an attempt to recolonise the region, and would not be welcomed by many Pacific nations.