Pacific

From Page 7 deserve,” Vice President Kamala Harris said last year as the Biden administration announced the expansion of its embassies. She said that was about to change.

Blinken’s brief Pacific tour this week also includes stops in New Zealand and Australia for bilateral talks, part of a broader outreach to the region. Earlier this year he visited Papua New Guinea, substituting for Biden after the president canceled a trip at the last minute to return to Washington to negotiate the debt ceiling, a blow to U.S. efforts to signal it takes the region seriously. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin will visit Papua New Guinea this week, while Interior Secretary Deb Haaland is visiting Palau and Micronesia.

Tonga, an archipelago kingdom of 105,000 people, borrowed extensively from China years ago to rebuild its capital following pro-democracy riots in 2006. Now its external debt stands at $430 million, with two-thirds of that owed to China, its budget records show. The Chinese loan is coming due next year, with payments set to triple - a possible example of the “debt-trap” diplomacy that China has been criticized for in recent years, although Chinese leaders say Tonga won’t be made to pay money it can’t afford.

Chinese diplomacy in recent years has otherwise been nimble. Chinese diplomats learn the Tongan language. They show up at public events. They make it easy to get visas. They spread development aid to towns around the country - and then they boast about it.

“My colleagues and I visited many schools, communities, plantations and families, and gained the firsthand understanding on what the people need,”

Chinese Ambassador to Tonga

Cao Xiaolin said at a handover ceremony of agricultural machinery last year, according to remarks posted on his embassy’s website. He said the embassy had sponsored about 100 aid projects, ranging from drinking water tanks for rural residents to agricultural training projects for farmers - the kind of soft power outreach that slowly

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