US Secretary of State Antony Blinken touched down in Australia on Wednesday, kicking off a week-long trip around the Asia-Pacific region.
In one of his first engagements, Mr Blinken on Thursday gave a speech to students at the University of Melbourne - an institution he says his family has a deep connection with.
His late stepfather, Samuel Pisar, graduated from the university's law school in 1953 after being the only member of his immediate family to survive the Holocaust. His experience included time in concentration camps before he escaped and was rescued by American GIs. He was eventually brought to Australia by two uncles who had settled in the country.
Mr Blinken said because of this, Australia holds "a particularly special place” for his family.
“He was 16 years old by the time he got to Australia. And as he put it, as he told us, as he told the family for years, Australia remade him... And this institution was fundamental to that,” he told students on Thursday.
“Despite the vast distance between us geographically… there's virtually no distance between [Australia and the US] when it comes to our basic outlook, to our basic values, to our basic interests.”
Mr Blinken on Friday will be meeting with foreign ministers from the Quad member countries - which include the United States, India, Japan and Australia - the bloc of Indo-Pacific democracies that was created to counter China.
It is the fourth Quad meeting and the third where ministers are seeing each other in person.
"Whether it’s climate, whether it’s COVID, whether it’s the impact of emerging technologies – not a single one of these issues can be effectively dealt with by any one of us acting alone," Mr Blinken said in an address to US embassy staff in Melbourne on Thursday.
"Even the United States, with all our resources and all our strength, we can’t do it alone. More than ever before, we need partnerships, we need alliances, we need coalitions of countries willing to put their efforts, their resources, their minds into tackling these problems."
On Saturday, Mr Blinken will fly to Fiji where he will meet with leaders of Pacific Island nations before visiting Hawaii where he will meet with Japanese and Korean counterparts.
Mr Blinken said in a statement on Wednesday that in Hawaii, the nations will discuss a range of issues including “the challenges posed by North Korea.”
What will Blinken discuss with the Quad?
Mr Blinken said he believes there is a “strong incentive” for Quad nations to come together and determine the norms and standards in the region.
He said on Thursday that it all starts with like-minded countries “putting their resources together'' to “advance and make progress".
"And that's fundamentally what this relationship between the United States and Australia is all about," Mr Blinken added.
Susannah Patton, director of the power and diplomacy program at the Lowy Institute, said Mr Blinken’s visit is the first high-level visit to Australia by any cabinet member of the Biden administration.
“Blinken's decision to travel to Australia is really a reflection of the priority that he attaches not just to the relationship with Australia, but to the broader Indo-Pacific region,” she said.
“[It’s] a really important sign that the four Quad countries remain committed to taking forward cooperation together following the two Leaders Summits that were held last year.”
She said the agenda of the meeting is likely to be broad, but the main objective will be a show of solidarity from the nations to counter Chinese influence in the region.
“The main outcome that all the countries will want to have is… a strong symbolic message that the US and its key partners and allies in the Indo-Pacific region are offering an alternative vision to the one that's being presented by China,” she said.
Ms Patton said tension between Russia and Ukraine is likely to come up, but the US will likely want to focus the meeting on the Indo-Pacific.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken takes part in a health security partnerships roundtable at Biomedical Precinct in Melbourne. Source: Reuters Pool via AAP
“The meeting is an important signal that the US isn't being too distracted by events in Europe,” she said.
“Australia, and to an extent Japan, are locked in behind US positions on Russia [but] India has a different relationship with Russia, they have important defence ties.
“That might limit the ability of the Quad group to cooperate together in relation to the Ukraine issue.”
Other issues that are likely to come up include cooperation in cyberspace, infrastructure, climate and energy, as well as the Quad’s commitment to deliver more than one billion vaccine doses to countries in the Indo-Pacific.
What is on the cards for Blinken’s Fiji trip?
Mr Blinken’s Fiji trip will mark the first time in 40 years that a US secretary of state has visited the Pacific Island nation.
Speaking ahead of his arrival in Australia, Mr Blinken said forging closer ties with Pacific nations is an important part of this trip.
"We’re a Pacific nation. The Pacific part of the Indo-Pacific Strategy is vitally important, and in the category of 90 percent of life is showing up or showing up; but more than showing up, I think you’ll see some very concrete things come out of the visit to Fiji."
Dr Tess Newton Cain, program leader at Griffith University’s Pacific Hub, said the visit is significant in sending a signal that the US is devoting energy to re-engage in the Pacific.
“In the Pacific region generally there's been a bit of a sense that the US would kind of leave oversight of that region to Australia and New Zealand," she told SBS News.
“The Secretary of State has said that there will be some very concrete outcomes of his trip to Fiji, so we might hear some significant announcements, but it’s not completely clear what they'll be.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will meet virtually with Pacific leaders in Fiji. Source: AAP
Dr Newton Cain said there’s been a “geostrategic anxiety” in Washington over the rise of China in the region.
However, she said for Mr Blinken to show the US is ready to be a trusted ally to Pacific Island nations, there needs to be a genuine engagement in issues of concern for those countries.
“Whether it’s in relation to recovery from the impacts of COVID-19 or management of resources such as fisheries, these are issues that Pacific Island leaders have already identified as the ones that they care about.
“To demonstrate that the US is a trusted friend and partner to these countries, [Mr Blinken] needs to be talking their language and not using his stopover as a platform to engage in any sort of megaphone diplomacy… as a signal to Beijing.
“I think that that would be a waste of this opportunity and it would be very disappointing to see.”
Dr Newtown Cain said Pacific Island nations have diverse and varying relationships with China.
She said Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Vanuatu all possess strong diplomatic relations with Beijing.
On the other end of the spectrum, countries such as Tuvalu, Palau, Marshall Islands and Nauru don’t have relations with China as they are recognised partners of Taiwan, according to Dr Newtown Cain.
She said Pacific Island nations are after longstanding, mature diplomatic ties where they are listened to and considered as equal partners.
“I think that Pacific leaders have a degree of healthy scepticism about the resurgence of interest in their region,” she said.
"I think that they are concerned that it's very reactive, that it's all about China; and that if China were to lose interest in the region, that people like the US and Australia and the UK, might lose interest in the region as well.
"There's no one in the Pacific that is interested in being a prize that people fight over or being used as pawns on some sort of geostrategic chessboard."
