Ocean of peace in a world at war

As a consequence of my Scottish Jewish heritage, I only read a newspaper if it is free.

Since Covid, newspapers have disappeared from hotels and airline lounges never to return, nothing to do with covid I suspect, more to do with beancounters oozing their furtive frugality.

To get to my favourite part of a newspaper, the cartoon section, I flick through pages of headlines blaring about a world at war, fighting or arguing, almost everywhere.

Where indeed are the world's peacekeepers? Well the UN has peacekeepers in 11 sites, yes mainly in the middle east – why does that not surprise you?

It may come as a surprise to readers that the South Pacific nation of Fiji has been supplying peacekeeping forces for more than four decades. Fiji has sent more troops and police per capita to serve UN peacekeeping operations than any other country in the world.

It may also be surprising to readers that the present Prime Minister of Fiji, Major General (rtd) Sitiveni Rabuka was a peacekeeping soldier leading the Fijian contingent of UNIFIL in Lebanon, from June 1980 to July 1981, worked alongside French and indeed saved the life of a French Officer and was awarded the Legion of Honour medal. He did another 2 years of leadership in the Sinai in the mid 80's

For his service in Lebanon, Rabuka was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II in the 1981 Birthday Honours List.

Working on an earlier 1980 theme, Rabuka has promoted the Ocean of Peace concept in September 2023 during the United Nations General Assembly debate in New York.

For sure the South Pacific has had their share of disputes, the Solomons and New Caledonia being recent examples. A peacekeeping presence within the region is certainly a positive aspect and Rabuka has the track record in driving this. But how is this to take shape?

At present Fiji is committing to a 73m Ocean of Peace vessel capable of regional disaster response, amphibious beach landings similar to the latest United States Marine Corps (USMC) vessel, to provide a much-needed regional capability.

At present when southwest Pacific islands are struck by cyclones or tsunamis, the affected area has to wait for Australia or New Zealand to select a vessel and equip it for the task, sometimes taking 2-3 weeks to arrive at the disaster site.

This Fiji-based vessel can carry 84 disaster response containers which can cater for up to 750 people in distress, and can reach most neighbouring nations within 2 days.