KEY TAKEAWAYS
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Kiribati President Taneti Maamau, reelected last week, will probably use his third term to continue strengthening ties with China. U.S. relations with Kiribati, however, remain less well established. Since last year, the number of U.S. embassies in the Pacific Islands has leapt from six to nine, reflecting the region’s higher priority to the United States as its concerns have grown about China’s engagement. But efforts to build a U.S. embassy in Kiribati — the closest country to Hawai‘i — have stalled because of Maamau’s government.
Nevertheless, Kiribati is a logical focal point for greater U.S. engagement given its geographic proximity and strategic significance and the historical ties between the two countries. China’s overtures to Kiribati have reawakened U.S. interest there, but the challenge for the United States will be sustaining that attention while addressing the suspicion that Kiribati appears to have toward Washington.
Maamau won with 55 percent of the vote, unexpectedly challenged by Kaotitaake Kokoria, a political unknown who broke away from the ruling Tobwaan Kiribati Party days before the election and won 42 percent of the vote. The opposition leader, Tessie Lambourne, was blocked from running, and in September she called the country a “one-party state” because the only candidates eligible to run for president came from Maamau’s party.
Lambourne said that under Maamau’s leadership, Kiribati has descended into “authoritarianism and isolationism” over the last eight years. It is among the lowest-ranked Pacific Island countries for media freedom, stifling local journalists and even deporting some foreign ones. In April, a years-long judicial crisis culminated in the deportation of Australian judge David Lambourne, the opposition leader’s husband. A former president of Kiribati and a U.N. special rapporteur warned that this undermined Kiribati’s judicial independence.
Kiribati is a small country by land area, but not by other metrics. With 33 islands spanning four hemispheres, it has an exclusive economic zone larger than the landmass of India, yielding the largest tuna catch of any nation in the world. On the global stage, its population of roughly 135,000 may appear tiny, but not in Oceania; it is the sixth most populous Pacific Island country. In addition to its size and resources, Kiribati has other uses for China: a U.N. vote and the ability to reinforce Beijing’s legitimacy by recognizing it over Taipei. All these factors have led China to court Kiribati, leaving the United States scrambling to catch up.
In addition to its size and resources, Kiribati has other uses for China: a U.N. vote and the ability to reinforce Beijing’s legitimacy by recognizing it over Taipei.
Maamau has welcomed China’s aid, and his third term is expected to continue along similar lines. Under his leadership, Kiribati switched recognition from Taiwan to China in 2019, and received $161 million in Chinese aid over the next two years, including projects on climate resiliency. In 2020, Maamau visited Beijing, where he met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping and signed on to China’s Belt and Road Initiative. More recently, Chinese engagement with Kiribati has included strengthening fishery ties and providing free medical services, desalination equipment, funding for community gardens and policing assistance.
Maamau has also shown some willingness to push back against Beijing. In early October, his office issued a rare public rebuke after China fired an unarmed intercontinental ballistic missile into the ocean near Kiribati’s southern islands.
As Maamau forges closer ties with China, Kiribati appears to be pulling away from its largest donor, Australia. Australian officials have had their visas denied or delayed, and one Australian Navy officer was expelled from the country for late paperwork. Talks about a bilateral strategic partnership agreement, originally set to be signed last year, were postponed until after the election. The United States has faced similar visa challenges, resulting in fewer diplomatic visits and preventing the establishment of a U.S. presence in the capital, Tarawa. The relationship is managed by the U.S. Embassy in Fiji.
In 2021, Beijing proposed upgrading a World War II runway on Kiribati’s Kanton Island, raising alarm in Washington. China has used the country for strategic purposes in the past: from 1997 to 2003, before Kiribati switched recognition to Taiwan, China operated a satellite tracking station in Tarawa. The satellite dishes would routinely point northwest toward a U.S. missile test site on Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
Kiribati’s proximity to Hawai‘i and significance during World War II make potential Chinese military interest there a concern for the U.S. government, as does its location in the central Pacific astride major sea lanes between the United States, Australia and New Zealand. Kiribati was occupied by Japan after Pearl Harbor and became the site of pivotal battles early in the United States’ Pacific campaign; later in the war, its islands served as support bases for U.S. operations in the region.
U.S. ties to Kiribati go back even further. The United States claimed more than a dozen islands in Kiribati between the 1850s and 1970s but ceded control of them in a 1979 Treaty of Friendship, which became a framework for maintaining bilateral relations. For decades, the Peace Corps was the main U.S. presence in the country, but it departed in 2008 due to inconsistent air links and lack of health care for volunteers. Today, the U.S. government provides multiple forms of assistance to Kiribati, including on climate resilience, coastal fisheries management, combating illegal fishing and building job skills for young people through a Millennium Challenge Corporation program. Kiribati is also a major beneficiary of the U.S.-South Pacific Tuna Treaty.
There are more surprising ties between the United States and Kiribati. The country’s name, pronounced “Kiribas,” is the local pronunciation of “Gilberts” after the British colonial term “Gilbert Islands.” However, the unique spelling was caused by an American visitor, a faulty typewriter and an accident of history. In 1857, U.S. missionary Hiram Bingham, Jr., arrived in Kiribati to translate the Bible into the local language. To do so, he had to create a spelling system using the Roman alphabet, but the “s” key on his typewriter was broken. He substituted “ti” for “s” because it makes a similar sound in the word “nation,” and Kiribati has followed that orthography ever since.
Bingham’s oddly pivotal role reflects U.S.-Kiribati historical and religious ties, and yet it is also symbolic of a lack of planning or attention that has defined the relationship ever since, apart from World War II. When I visited Kiribati last year, a U.S. delegation had just visited to search for an embassy site, and islanders remarked wryly that they hadn’t seen so many Americans since the Battle of Tarawa in 1943. This spike of U.S. interest has created a variety of local reactions, ranging from support to indifference to the apprehension that the United States plans to use Kiribati for military purposes once again. While that theory would likely cause confusion in Washington, it is a natural consequence when U.S. attention suddenly makes a resurgence.
Due to these fluctuations in U.S. engagement with Kiribati, focusing on local priorities will help show that U.S. interest is genuine and not transactional. As elsewhere in the Pacific, the United States’ best shot at outcompeting China is, paradoxically, to avoid discussing China when possible, and simply offer countries better options. The Kiribati government does not want to be treated as a pawn in a geopolitical game, and the more the United States can help address pressing issues affecting local communities and build local capacity, the better U.S. engagement will be received.
As elsewhere in the Pacific, the United States’ best shot at outcompeting China is, paradoxically, to avoid discussing China when possible, and simply offer countries better options.
Kiribati faces numerous environmental challenges. The low-lying country is extremely vulnerable to sea-level rise, coastal erosion and storms: most homes stand feet from the water’s edge. In 2022 and 2023, prolonged drought exacerbated Kiribati’s water insecurity and severe rate of malnutrition, which is among the highest in the region. With very little land, there are few places to dispose of waste. One of the larger islands, Kiritimati, was polluted by British and U.S. nuclear tests during the Cold War, and Tarawa still has unexploded ordnance from World War II.
The country also faces chronic social challenges. About 30 percent of the population live below the poverty line, jobs are scarce, and the cost of living is rising. There are few schools on the outer islands, driving migration into the overcrowded capital. Many young people leave for employment opportunities in Australia and New Zealand. Noncommunicable diseases are on the rise, but health services are insufficient. A staggering 68 percent of women experience domestic violence, almost double the global average. Modern slavery and human trafficking have also become increasingly prevalent.
Meanwhile, the economy is weak and heavily reliant on a single sector. Fishing licenses accounted for 70 percent of Kiribati’s total revenue in 2020, but the country is likely losing millions of dollars each year due to illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing. Kiribati reopened a marine protected area to commercial vessels in 2021 to increase revenue, but this also raised concerns about illegal fishing and biodiversity loss.
The government of Kiribati would likely appreciate greater U.S. partnership in a variety of areas, providing that consultations are held first, and the United States follows through on its proposals. Kiribati also receives assistance from Australia, Japan and New Zealand, making it necessary for the United States to coordinate with these partners to avoid duplication. The U.S. government should give greater visibility to its existing programs, including the Millennium Challenge Corporation program and educational grants and exchanges, while considering areas of expansion. The return of the Peace Corps, in particular, would be a welcome sign of U.S. support.
To strengthen the bilateral relationship, the United States must sustain its attention toward Kiribati, but Tarawa must also be willing to move away from its isolationist foreign policy and engage with Washington.