By Lewis Jackson
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Pacific Island nations are at risk of becoming bases for global criminal gangs, a report by the United Nations drug authority said on Friday, as criminal activity surges across the isolated and economically vulnerable region.
The report by United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime said the “threat environment” in the region from drug and people trafficking, illegal fishing and wildlife theft, money laundering and cybercrime is rising faster than at any other point in history.
The region is now home to drug cartels from the Americas, outlaw motorcycle gangs from Australia and New Zealand as well as Asian crime groups, it said.
“The thriving criminal ecosystem in the Pacific has attracted powerful transnational criminal networks from different corners of the world,” the report said.
“There are growing concerns that parts of the region may mature into key nodes and footholds targeted by criminal groups engaged in a range of illicit activities.”
Spread across thousands of kilometres (miles) of ocean, Pacific Island countries and territories are particularly vulnerable because of their isolation and economic vulnerability as well as high levels of corruption and limited state capacity, it said.
Many Pacific Islands have historically relied on foreign countries like Australia to help with policing, an issue that’s become geopolitically charged since China deployed police to the Solomon Islands in 2022. It also has officers in Kiribati.
Australia said earlier this year China should have no role policing the region and has committed A$400 million ($270 million) to help train and deploy police in the region.
Its ally the United States, also concerned about China’s influence in the region, said in August it would work with the region to police drug trafficking by criminal groups in China and Southeast Asia.
($1 = 1.4828 Australian dollars)
(Reporting by Lewis Jackson, Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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